The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1895-07-10
hREV. DIR. TALMAGE
SUNDAYS DISCOURSE BY THE
NOTED DIVINE.
Subject: "Woman's Opportunity. +"

God, who can make no mistake, made mar
aud woman for specific work and to move
III particular sphereS-man to be regnant
IN his realm: woman to be dominant in hers
The boundary line between Italy and Switz
erland, between England and Scotland is
not more thoroughly marked than this dis.
tinction between the empire masculine and
the empire feminine. So entirely dissimlal
are the fieldSto 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 su.
perlority OF one sex to the other sex is m
everlasting waste Of ink and speech A jew
eler NAV have scale so delicate that ne can
weigh the dust Of diamonds. but where are
the scales so delicate that YOU can weigh in
them affection against affection. sentiment
against sentiment. thought against thought,
soul against soul. mans world against a
woman'S world? You come out with your
stereotyped remark that man is superior to
woman in intellect. and then I open on my
desk the swarthy, iron typed, thunderbolted
writings OF Harriet Martineau and Elizabeth
Browning and George Eliot. You come on
with your rstereotyped remark about woman s
superiority to man in the item of affection.
but 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 were so large that
after you had rolled into it two hemispheres
there was room still left to marshal the hosts
OF heaven and set up the throne of the eter-
nal Jehovah. deny to man the throne in
tellectua: deny to woman the throne af-
fectional No human phraseology will ever
define the spheres. while there is an intuition
by which we know when 4 man is in his
realm. and when woman is in her realm.
and when either of them is out of it. No
bun,linS legislature ought to attempt to
make definition orto say. This is the line
and that is the line" My theory is that If
woman wants to vote she ought to vote. and
that ii n man wants to embroider and keep
house lie ought to he allowed to embroider
and keep house. There are masculine wo-
men and there are effeminate men. My
theory is that you have no right to interfere
with any ones doing anything that is
righteous. Albany and Washington might as
we'll decree by legislation how high brown
thraSner should flv or how deep trout
shoulG plunge as to tryto seek out the height
and depth Of womans duty. The question
OF capacity will settle finally the whole ques
tion, the whole subject. When woman is
prepared to preach. she will preach. and
neither conference nor presbytery can hinder
her. When n woman Is prepared to move
In highest commercial spheres, she vii! have
great influence on the exchange, and no
boards OF trade anhinder her. want wo-
man to understand that heart and brain can
overly any barrier that politicians may set
up. and that nothing can keep her back or
keep her down but the question Of incapac-
ity.
was in New Zealand last year just after
the opportunity Of suffrage had been con-
ferred upon women. The plan worked WELL
There had never been such good order vt
the polls, and the righteousness triumphed.
Men haze not made such wonderful moral
success Of the ballot box that they need fear
women will corrupt it, In all our cities man
has so nearly made the ballot box failule,
suppose we let women try. But there are
some women. know, OF most undesirable
nature. who wander up and down the coun-
try-having no homes Of their own or for
saking their own homes-talk liking about their
rights, and we know very well that they
themselves are fit neither to vote nor keep
house. Their mission seems merely to hui
initiate the two sexes at the thought OF what
any one ofus might become. No one would
want to live under the laws that such women
would enact or to have cast upon society the
children that such women would raise. But
shall show you that the best rights that
woman can own she already has in her pos
this time is not one of commiSeration. but
one Of congratulation: that the grandeur
and power Of her realm have never yet been
appreciated: that she sits to-day on throne
so high that all the thrones of earth piled on
top of each other would not make for her
a footstool. Here is the platform on which
she stands. Away down below it are
the ballot box and the congressional assem-
blage and the legislative hall. Woman
always has voted and always will vote. Our
great-srandfathers thought they were by
their votes putting Washington into the Pres
idental chair, No. His mother, by the
principles she taught him. and by the habits
she inculcated, made him President. 1t was
Christian mothers hand dropping the bal
lot when Lord Bacon wrote and Newton
philosophical and Alfred the Great governed
and Jonathan Edwards thundered of judg-
ment to come.
How many men there have been in high
political station who would have been in.
sufficient to stand the test to which their
moral principle WAS put had it not been for
a wife's voice that encouraged them to do
right and wife's prayer that sounded louder
OF suffrage as We men exercise it seems to be
a feeble thing. You, Christian man. come
up to the ballot box and you drop your vote.
Right after you comes libertine or sot-
the offscouring Of the street-and he drops
his vote, and his vote counteracts yours.
But il in the quiet OF home life daughter by
her Christian demeanor. a wife by her in
dustry, a mother by her faithfulness, casts
vote in the right direction, then nothing can
resist it, and the influence Of that vote will
throb through the eternities.
My chief anxiety then is not that woman
have other rights accorded her, but that she,
=, 1lor 80 Id S,ca 20 thn
ton OF the glorious rights she already pos
sesses. First, she has the right to make
home happy. That realm no one has ever
disputed with her. Men may come home at
noon or at night, and then tarry a compare
lively little while, but she. ali day long, gov
erns it, beauties it, sanctifles it. 1t is with
in her power to make it the most attractive
place on earth. 1t is the only calm harbor
in this world. You know as we'll as I do that
this outside world and the business world
arc long scene of jostle and contention.
The man who has dollar struggles to keer
it: the man who has it not struggles to get it.
Prices up. Prices down. Losses. Gains.
Misrepresentation. Underselling. Buyers
depreciating; statesmen eXaggerating. Ten
ants seeking less rent; landlords demanding
more. Struggles about Office. Men who are
in trying to keep in: men out trying to get
in. Slips. Tumbles. Defalcations. Pan
les. Catastrophes. 0 woman, thank God
you have home, and that YOU may be
queen in it. Better be there than wear Vic
toria's corpnet. Better be there than carry
the purse Of princess.
Your abode may be humble, but you can,
by your faith in God and your cheerfulness
Of demeanor. gild it with splendors such us
an upholsterer's hand never yet kindled.
There are abodes in every city-humble, two
stories, four plain, unpapered rooms, unde-
sirable neighborhood. and yet there is man
who would die on the threshold rather than
surrender Why? 1t is home. Whenever
he thinks Of it he sees angels Of God hover
ing around it. The ladders OF heaven are let