The Washington herald., 1917-08-08
Is Any Old Maid Only Fourth of Woman
By DOROTHY DIX.
The Worlds Highest Paid, Woman Writer

Not long ago a clever writer de-
clared that an old bachelor was only
half a man.
An unmarried woman says: Bach
elors stand in higher esteem socially
than spinsters do, so IL bachelor is
only half a man are we old maids
only a fourth OF a woman?"
Nonsense. There is no spiritual Ber-
tillon system of measurements by
which We can gauge the essence of
the individual and tell what he or she
is to himself or herself, or what he
or she gives to the world or gets out
Of life. And that constitutes the man
or woman's value and is his or her
number.
Many of the biggest Drained, big
gest hearted, biggest souled, tender
est, most sympathetic, and helpful
people never marry. and to say that
these are half or quarter size portions
of humanity is folly.
This is particularly true of women
for the reason that most old maids
are old maids because they were finer
and more discriminating than the ma
jority Of their married sisters. Any
woman who is not an actual mon
strosity can acquire a husband If she
will take any sort OF one that she
can get. 1t is the women who have
the courage of their. convictions not
to marry at all unless they can find
a man who comes up to their ideal
Of manhood, who fill the ranks OF the
bachelor maids.
And it is these women who are in
the forefront of every movement for
the public good and who in private
are the self-sacrificing props that keep
millions Of other peoples homes from
topping into ruins.
1t Is the daughter who never mar
ries who takes care of the old father
and mother and humors their whims
and crochets. 1t is the old maid sis
ter who teaches school and gives the
younger members OF the family the
chance In life she never had. 1t is
the old maid aunt who buys the baby
shoes, and sends Johnnie to college,
and gives Mamie pretty dresses, in a
million families where the husband
and father fails in business. And it's
the old maid who runs philanthropies
and organization charities and is a
power for civic righteousness in every
community in the land.
II the average old maid is not only
one-fourth woman the other three
fourths are plain unadulterated angel.
To think of her or speak of her as
one who is set apart from the ordi-
nary interests of life is to show that
one has little knowledge of the mod
ern woman and her activities.
OF course 1t is not to be denied that
marriage and parenthood are the most
vital of all human experiences. and
perhaps no man or woman has lived
a perfectly full life who has not been
through both and known the joy and
suffering they bring. Ones heart
chords must have been played upon
by the hand of husband, or wife, and
child before one has run the whole
garnut of emotion. And perhaps those
who have missed that do lack some
thing of complete development.
These things, however, do not make
necessarily for individual happiness,
or even for the rounding out into
beautiful symmetry Of the individual
character. Even parenthood does not
invariably bring Joy and tenderness
with it, nor act as a touchstone that
calls out what is noblest and best in
a man or woman.
Many children come unwanted into
the world and are regarded as bur-
den by their parents. We hear women
complaining because they are tied
down at home by baby hands and be-
cause they have to slave over darning
little socks and washing dirty little
faces and answering ceaseless calls
for mother. We hear fathers grumb-
ling at the bills for food for hungry
little mouths and for the clothes to
cover restless little bodies.
Still whether they have borne
gladly or sullenly the burden of the
helpless babe that has been laid In
their arms, the man and woman who
have felt the clinging of feeble little
fingers to theirs have had something
wonderful in their lives that the old
bachelor and old maid never know.
and that must needs make them either
better or worse.
Pretty much the same thing may be
said about matrimony. Marriage is
the crucible in which character is
tried out and no man and woman
come out of that fiery furnace the
same as they were when they went
into 1t.
Marriage brings out the best and the
worst that is In human nature. 1t is
the greatest enlightsner. 1t not only
reveals to the man or woman un-
imagined heights Of nobility to which
the soul can soar. but depths Of mean
ness into which 1t can descend 1t
teaches not only how one can love
but how one can hate, for only in
marriage with its incessant and forced
companionship does the human rela-
tionship reach its climax of perfect
congeniality or utter repulsion.
This explains why we invariably no.
tice that people change after they
marry. Sometimes a man who has
ban hard and aurly and cold Mill