Shenandoah herald. [volume] (Woodstock, Va.) 1865-1974, 1895-06-21
DOMINION OF WOMAN.
THE GLORIOUS RIGHTS SHE ALREADY
POSSESSES.
Rev. DIR. Talmage Favors Woman Suffrage,
but He Sees Higher Rights For Women
Than ThIs-The Realm of Home-An
Allegory.

AlleEory.
ST. LOUIS, June 16.-In his sermon
for today Rev. DR.. Talmage, who has
reached this city on his western tour,
discusses a subject Of universal interest
viz, "Woman's Opportunity"-his text
being, "She shall be called woman, "
Genesis ii, 23.
God, who can make no mistake, made
man and woman for a specific work and
to move in particular spheres-man to
be regnant in his realm; woman to be
dominant in hers. The boundary line
between Italy and Switzerland, between
England and Scotland, is not more
thoroughly marked than this distinction
between the empire masculine and the
empire feminine So entirely dissimilar
are the fields to which God called them
that you can no more compare them
than You can oxygen and hydrogen,
water and grass, trees and stars. All
this talk about the superiority Of one
sex TO the other sex. is an everlasting
waste Of ink and speech. A jeweler may
have a scale so delicate that he can
weigh the dust Of diamonds, but where
are the scales so delicate that you can
weigh in them affection against affec-
tion, sentiment against sentiment,
thought against thought, soul against
soul, a mans world against a woman s
world! You come out with your stereo-
typed remark that man is superior to
woman in intellect, and then l open on
my desk the swarthy, iron typed, thun-
derbolted writings Of Harriet Martineau
and Elizabeth Browning and George
Eliot. You come on with your stereo-
typed remark about woman's superiori-
ty to man in the item Of affection, but
I ask you where was there more capa-
city to love than in John, the disciple,
and Matthew Simpson, the bishop, and
Henry Martyr, the missionary!
The heart of those men was so large
that after you had rolled into 1t two
hemispheres there was room still left to
marshal the hosts Of heaven and set up
the throne Of the eternal Jehovah. | de-
ny to man the throne intellectual; de-
nv to woman the throne affectiOnaL No
human phraseology will ever define the
spheres. while there is an intuition by
which we know when a man is in his
realm. and when a woman is in her
realm. and when either Of them is out
Of it. No bungling legislature ought to
attempt TO make a definition or to say,
This Is the line and that is the line. "
Nv theory is that if woman wants to
vote she ought to vote, and that II a
man wants TO embroider and keep house
he ought to be allowed to embroider
and keep house. There are masculine
women and there are effeminate men,
Nv theory is that you have no right to
interfere with any ones doing anything
that is righteous. Albany and Washing
ton might as we'll decree by legislation
how high a brown thrasher should fly
or how deep a trout should plunge as to
try to seek ont the height and depth OF
woman's duty. The question Of capa-
city will settle finally the whole ques-
tion. the whole subject When a woman
is prepared to preach, she will preach
and neither conference nor presbytery
can hinder her. When woman is pre-
pared to move in highest commercial
spheres, she will have great influence on
the exchange, and no boards OF trade
can hinder her. want woman to un-
derstand that heart and brain can over
Ay any barrier that politicians may set
up. and that nothing can keep her back
or keep her down but the question OF
incapacity.
Women and the Ballot.
was in New Zealand last year just
after the opportunity Of suffrage had
been conferred upon women. The plan
worked we'll There had never been such
good order at the polls, and righteous
ness triumphed. Men have not made
such a wonderful moral success Of the
ballot box that they need fear women
will corrupt it. In all our cities man
has 80 nearly made the ballot box
failure, suppose we let women try. Bp'
there are some women, l know, OF most
undesirable nature. who wander up ano
down the cOuntry-having no homes Of
their own or forsaking their own homes
talking about their rights, and We
know very well that they themselves
ara fit neither to vote nor to keep house.
Their mission seems merely to humil
ate the two sexes at the thought OF
what any one Of US might become. NC
one would want to live under the laws
that such women would enact or to have
cast upon society the children that sucf
women would raise. But shall show
Won that the best rights that woman
can own she already has in her posses
sion; that her position in this country
at this time is not one OF commisera
ton. but one of congratulation; thai
the grandeur and power Of her realm
have never yet been appreciated; tnal
she sits today on q throne so high thai
all the thrones Of earth piled on top Of
each other would not make for her
footstool. Here is the platform ON which
she stands. Away down below 1t arr
the ballot box and the congressional as
semblage and the Legislative hall
Woman always has voted and always
will vote. Our great t-grandfatheri
thought they were by their votes put
ting Washington into the presidential
chair. No. His mother, by the princi
ples she taught him, and by the habit'
she inculcated, made him president Il
was a Christian mothers hand drop
ping the ballot when Lord Bacon wrote
and Newton philosophical and Alfre'
the Great governed and Jonathan Ed
wards thundered Of Judgment to come.
How many men there have been IL
high political station who would hav'
been insufficient to stand the test u
which their moral principle was pu
bad it not been for wife's voice tina
encouraged them to do right and
wife's prayer that sounded louder thar
the clamor Of partisanship1 The righ
Of suffrage as we men exercise it seem
10 be feeble thing. You, Christian
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