Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1895-12-21

you can nave no question: u tHdl lue very
air OF Boston is so infected with deadly
germs of the New Woman 1 would not dare
stay there longer than a week. 1t would
mean certain loss Of all but my intellect.
and heaven help the woman Invested of her
heart and every becoming human infirmity!
had an appointment with the New Wo-
man at her office. She edits magazine.
Not that this is all she does. Dear, no! She
conducts classes in parliamentary law in
seven separate cities round about Boston
She Is president of the largest woman's club
in Boston, vice president of two lesser ones
an officer in the National Federation of
Clubs, and only the day before got there
she had resigned ten vice presidencies in
bunch! This was not to rest however, but
to allow her more time to devote to certain
work she was conducting at the Atlanta
exposition. Oh, yes-it Is natural to forget
them-she also operates home q husband
and a baby. I don't mean to say she forgets
these herself. She reconcileS them, and of
course when you have reconciled anything
so insignificant as a man. anything so tri-
hing as baby, with the stern, supreme
necessities Of the business. world and the
relentlessly advancing cause of human pro-
gress, these domestic factors can't cut very
much of figure.
Highly Intellectual.
The editorial New Woman was not on
hand when arrived, but there were others
her business associate and one of the
leading female pedagogues Of Boston.
On the side, there was man.
I don't know whether the pedagogue
carries this man around regularly to IL
lustrate her theories, but he certainly was
too pat with all she said to possibly be
accidentally present. FIe was intellectual
lied to point at which sex and almost
personal identity disappear in the nebulous
potentalitcs of immortal thought He
ha h1rD hoh nf
articulate speech to his passion for higher
things, and, striving to convey his soul in
words, he suffered. AS a whole-indeed,
any way one might take him-he accorded
perfectly with what the pedagogue was
saying of how immaterial men and women
are as such-that Is, as physical beings
to the final equations of human existence.
She was speaking with particular refer
ence to the relation of the sexes in mar
riage.
THE divine marriage she said. '1s in
herent in our natures and actualized in our
self-consciousness or soul When actualiz-
ed it is eternal. The marriage with which
we are familiar Is measure of discipline
In which souls are developed for the higher
union.'
Then. you don't think marriage is a
failure l ventured timidly The peda-
gogue was not a person to toy with in
these spiritual attitudes where our minds
were now exercising. Therefore it behoov-
ed me to speak cautiously and with every
said, in case she didn't like it. There was
no harm done. She answered me author-
tatively. but with mercy in her tones
You do not grasp the TRUTH said she.
Nothing depends upon marriage as it is
commonly understood. 1t can be neither
failure nor a success. The success or
failure is in the Individual as ne or she
applies himself to the duty of discovering
his soul mate
About True Mates.
But" I said. do not soul mates when
found usually bring about a divorce and
SO attest the failure of at least one in the
marriage series?'
mo; divorce as little as celibacy enters
with the real marriage question. AS we
conform In soul to the eternal patterns of
our being, we find our true mate, and &C.
tualize the divine marriage, Independent of
any circumstances. Every one has his
soul mate, and he must seek 1t in himself
When 1t Is found, he becomes androgyn-
GUS"
1 wanted to ask the little man If that
was what he was, but without any ques-
tioninS he went on to tell me that he is out
of 1t together.
n there is wh-where the real woman
movement op-p-p-operates," he said; men
are largely wh-wh-what women permit
them to be. When woman, coming out of
the subsection in which she has been held
ty the intellectual or male nature, sees
her f-f-f-fund-f-fundament equality yet
distinct office as the intuitive rather
than the r-r-reasoning power, she will
erect standard for both sexes which ac-
cords with -f-fund-fundamental neces-
sity rather than with custom which is
founded on a p-p-perverted view of it, and
of her ever-virgin nature m-m-man will be
reborn"
Poor little thing" I thought, "let us
thank heaven the New Woman has at
least left you the hope of a second time on
earth"
Tha hr1cf H1 4
been viewing with an unfriendly eye the
expression of maternal sympathy 1 could
rot help turning on the new man, began
catechising me with the cold. calculating
impersoEal curiosity of a census taker, and
when she got as far as How many chill
dren have your and I blurted out the
truth, replying two" 1 was made to feel
guilty of such an objectionable anachron-
ism that In my embarrassment 1 gasped,
How many have you?"
Harmless Remark After All.
Then 1 recalled she had been introduced
to me as Miss!
1 trembled at what was to follow, but
needlessly.
II have no children" she replied, calmly.
Happily, l arrived at the truth of the ma
ture and aim Of woman before any mistaken
conception Of this point had involved my
soul in the degrading complications Of ma
ternity.''
1t was an immense relief to me to have
the New Woman Editor dash in and bring
us back to earth. Oddly enough, this New
Woman with the purely intellectual mission
in life was not bit transcendental. She
looked as If she might even fall in love in
the good old-fashioned way, if she had time,
but she hadn't. There isn't time enough in
the whole extent Of duration of the whole
human species to supply that woman with
all she needs for her purposes. She really
hadn't time for anything she did. Yet, how
beautifully she managed without it! All at
once, without time for any one of us, she
planned with the pedagogue to address a
club in RoXbury the next evening, though in
all probability she would be obliged on that
evening to be in New York; she planned
with the New Man to be present at an ex-
hibition of cookery he to give the fol-
lowing Tuesday. though if she did not go to
New York the next evening she would GER
tainly be in Atlanta on that day; she plan
ned with her business associate about
changing printers, about getting a new IL
illustrator for the magazine, and how to de-
coy an advertisement out Of man who was
crank on antiques by taking to him that
afternoon an old china teapot that had been
given one of her ancestors by Daniel Web
ster, then, while the business associa tie
wrapped up the teapot, she scrubbed off a
few paragraphs, and between them planned