The Seattle post-intelligencer. [volume] (Seattle, Wash. Terr. [Wash.]) 1888-1914, 1900-06-24

said, acts from pure reason and by strict
rules of logic, whereas woman acts upon
intuition and with no rules worth speak
ing of. whether logical or otherwise. That
Is the priori fallacy which is just at
present being surely, slowly but surely.
demolished by the force of hard, dry
facts. Victor Hugo says the present is
lie steele des femmes. II really looks very
much like IL. Why should II not be sc?
The men have had long inning. Why
should not the women go to the wicket?
Now. here / am met by a preliminary
difficulty, which / feel will embarrass
me in the whole course of writing this
paper. Much as wish to keep what has
been wittily called THE perpendicular
pronoun" out of my lucubrations. | find
II simply impossible l am myself one
Of the team whom | pictured moment
ago as going to the wicket, bat in hand.
after a pretty long course of fielding;
and | must demur TO criticsng my fell
lows or Boosting about what l am going
to do. | will only say. watch us at the
wicket, and keep your eye on the score.
In other. and less metaphorical words.
see whether the women are better or
worse organized than the men. That is
the only fair way OF testing our faculties,
and of judging whether those faculties
are being properly trained and developed.
II the faculty Is not there. no amount of
training or of organization can call 1t into
being. We claim that II Is there. and we
are doing our level best to organize 1t.
Judge us by results.
Every original idea, it is said. has TO go
through two phases of development.
First of all, the jewellers in ruts and
grooves declare that 1t Is not true Then.
when IFS truth Is demonstrated they de-
clare that, II true. 1t is not new. That is
precisely what has happened to the dis
turbing personality whom they originally
denounced as the New Woman-Renerally
with capital letters and sometimes in
italics. First of all. these sticklers for
antiquity said the New Woman was not
true. It was not true to say that woman
had the same mental faculties as man,
and that those faculties could be trained
and organized in the same way as the in
tellects of the so-called superior sex.
Then, when certain feminine addenda ap-
peared in connection with the class lists
at the universities, and women began to
make their mark in the world, they shift
ed their ground and said that even If the
New Woman was true, she was not new.
1t was a contradiction of terms, of course
and spoiled their own epithet: but that
did not matter. The New Woman was
not new, but old; two centuries old at
least
quite recently an English newspaper.
plunging into the midst of this contro-
versy started on its quest of the proto-
plastic New Woman Who was the germ
They answered their own question by
fixing on Mary Astell who In 1894 pub
lished "A Serious Proposal TO the Ladies'"
and followed this up In 1897 with "A De-
Tense of the Ladies'" Her chief aim,
added this authority. was the establish
ment of college for women and I'm this
she was supported by Lady Elizabeth
Hastings, whose support took the sub
stantia and satisfactory form of a 10000
donation. Some authorities hofTi that this
truly regal contribution was actually Of
fered by the queen herself. but the
project was stopped by Bishop Atterbury,
and the reason for his interference serves
at once TO show the difference between
Mary Astells proposed college and those
which have become accomplished facts in
the present day. 1t was indeed good
deal more like an orthodox nunnery than
n ladies college as We understand the lat
ter term: and II was on account of its
papistical tendency that the idea was OPP
posed by Bishop Atterbury. Indeed,
Mary herself went a long way towards
owning the soft Impeachment. Her col
lege was confessedly designed for those
ladies who preferred retirement and study