CHAPTER II. CHAPTER II. 
"The vale best discovereth the hill. There is little friendship in the world, and least of all betvreen equals, which was wont to bemagnified. That that is, is between superior and inferior, whose fortunes may comprehend the one the other."
Bacon.
If a test of civilisation be sought, none can be so sure asthe condition of that half of society over which the other halfhas power,--from the exercise of the right of the strongest.Tried by this test, the American civilisation appears to be of alower order than might have been expected from some othersymptoms of its social state. The Americans have, in thetreatment of women, fallen below, not only their own democraticprinciples, but the practice of some parts of the Old World.
The unconsciousness of both parties as to the injuriessuffered by women at the hands of those who hold the poweris a sufficient proof of the low degree of civilisation in thisimportant particular at which they rest. While woman's intellectis confined, her morals crushed, her health ruined, herweaknesses encouraged, and her strength punished, she is toldthat her lot is cast in the paradise of women: and there is nocountry in the world where there is so much boasting of the"chivalrous" treatment she enjoys. That is to say,--shehas the best place in stage-coaches: when there are not chairsenough for everybody, the gentlemen stand: she hears oratoricalflourishes on public occasions about wives and home, andapostrophes to woman: her husband's hair stands on end at theidea of her working, and he toils to indulge her with money: shehas liberty to get her brain turned by religious excitements,that her attention may be diverted from morals, politics, andphilosophy; and, especially, her morals are guarded by thestrictest observance of propriety in her presence. In short,indulgence is given her as a substitute for justice. Her casediffers from that of the slave, as to the principle, just so faras this; that the indulgence is large and universal, instead ofpetty and capricious. In both cases, justice is denied on nobetter plea than the right of the strongest. In both cases, theacquiescence of the many, and the burning discontent of the few,of the oppressed testify, the one to the actual degradation ofthe class, and the other to its fitness for the enjoyment ofhuman rights.
The intellect of woman is confined. I met with immediate proofof this. Within ten days of my landing, I encountered threeoutrageous pedants, among the ladies; and in my progress throughthe country I met with a greater variety and extent of femalepedantry than the experience of a lifetime in Europe wouldafford. I could fill the remainder of my volume with sketches:but I forbear, through respect even for this very pedantry. Whereintellect has a fair chance, there is no pedantry, among men orwomen. It is the result of an intellect which cannot be whollypassive, but must demonstrate some force, and does so through themedium of narrow morals. Pedantry indicates the first struggle ofintellect with its restraints; and it is therefore a hopefulsymptom.
The intellect of woman is confined by an unjustifiablerestriction of both methods of education,--by express teaching,and by the discipline of circumstance. The former, though priorin the chronology of each individual, is a direct consequence ofthe latter, as regards the whole of the sex. As women have noneof the objects in life for which an enlarged education isconsidered requisite, the education is not given. Femaleeducation in America is much what it is in England. There is aprofession of some things being taught which are supposednecessary because everybody learns them. They serve to fill uptime, to occupy attention harmlessly, to improve conversation,and to make women something like companions to their husbands,and able to teach their children somewhat. But what is given is,for the most part, passively received; and what is obtained is,chiefly, by means of the memory. There is rarely or never acareful ordering of influences for the promotion of clearintellectual activity. Such activity, when it exceeds that whichis necessary to make the work of the teacher easy, is feared andrepressed. This is natural enough, as long as women are excludedfrom the objects for which men are trained. While there arenatural rights which women may not use, just claims which are notto be listened to, large objects which may not be approached,even in imagination, intellectual activity is dangerous: or, asthe phrase is, unfit. Accordingly, marriage is the only objectleft open to woman. Philosophy she may pursue only fancifully,and under pain of ridicule: science only as a pastime, and undera similar penalty. Art is declared to be left open: but thenecessary learning, and, yet more, the indispensable experienceof reality, are denied to her. Literature is also said to bepermitted: but under what penalties and restrictions? I need onlyrefer to the last three pages of the review of Miss Sedgwick'slast novel in the North American Review, to support all that canbe said of the insolence to which the intellect of women isexposed in America. I am aware that many blush for that article,and disclaim all sympathy with it: but the bare fact that any manin the country could write it, that any editor could sanction it,that such an intolerable scoff should be allowed to find its wayto the light, is a sufficient proof of the degradation of thesex. Nothing is thus left for women but marriage.--Yes; Religion,is the reply.--Religion is a temper, not a pursuit. It is themoral atmosphere in which human beings are to live and move. Mendo not live to breathe: they breathe to live. A German lady ofextraordinary powers and endowments, remarked to me withamazement on all the knowledge of the American women being basedon theology. She observed that in her own country theology hadits turn with other sciences, as a pursuit: but nowhere, but withthe American women, had she known it make the foundation of allother knowledge. Even while thus complaining, this lady statedthe case too favourably. American women have not the requisitesfor the study of theology. The difference between theology andreligion, the science and the temper, is yet scarcely known amongthem. It is religion which they pursue as an occupation; andhence its small results upon the conduct, as well as upon theintellect. We are driven back upon marriage as the only appointedobject in life: and upon the conviction that the sum andsubstance of female education in America, as in England, istraining women to consider marriage as the sole object in life,and to pretend that they do not think so.
The morals of women are crushed. If there be any human powerand business and privilege which is absolutely universal, it isthe discovery and adoption of the principle and laws of duty. Asevery individual, whether man or woman, has a reason and aconscience, this is a work which each is thereby authorised to dofor him or herself. But it is not only virtually prohibited tobeings who, like the American women, have scarcely any objects inlife proposed to them; but the whole apparatus of opinion isbrought to bear offensively upon individuals among women whoexercise freedom of mind in deciding upon what duty is, and themethods by which it is to be pursued. There is nothingextraordinary to the disinterested observer in women being sogrieved at the case of slaves,-- slave wives and mothers, as wellas spirit broken men,--as to wish to do what they could for theirrelief: there is nothing but what is natural in their beingashamed of the cowardice of such white slaves of the north as aredeterred by intimidation from using their rights of speech and ofthe press, in behalf of the suffering race, and in theirresolving not to do likewise: there is nothing but what isjustifiable in their using their moral freedom, each for herself,in neglect of the threats of punishment: yet there were no boundsto the efforts made to crush the actions of women who thus usedtheir human powers in the abolition question, and the convictionsof those who looked on, and who might possibly be warmed intofree action by the beauty of what they saw. It will be rememheredthat they were women who asserted the right of meeting and ofdiscussion, on the day when Garrison was mobbed in Boston. Billswere posted about the city on this occasion, denouncing thesewomen as casting off the refinement and delicacy of their sex:the newspapers, which laud the exertions of ladies in all othercharities for the prosecution of which they are wont to meet andspeak, teemed with the most disgusting reproaches andinsinuations: and the pamphlets which related to the question allpresumed to censure the act of duty which the women had performedin deciding upon their duty for themselves.--One lady, of hightalents and character, whose books were very popular before shedid a deed greater than that of writing any book, in acting uponan unusual conviction of duty, and becoming an abolitionist, hasbeen almost excommunicated since. A family of ladies, whosetalents and conscientiousness had placed them high in theestimation of society as teachers, have lost all their pupilssince they declared their anti-slavery opinions. The reproach inall the many similar cases that I know is, not that the ladieshold anti-slavery opinions, but that they act upon them. Theincessant outcry about the retiring modesty of the sex proves theopinion of the censors to be, that fidelity to conscience isinconsistent with retiring modesty. If it be so, let the modestysuccumb. It can be only a false modesty which can be thusendangered. No doubt, there were people in Rome who werescandalised at the unseemly boldness of christian women who stoodin the amphitheatre to be torn in pieces for their religion. Nodoubt there were many gentlemen in the British army who thoughtit unsuitable to the retiring delicacy of the sex that the wivesand daughters of the revolutionary heroes should be revolutionaryheroines. But the event has a marvellous efficacy in modifying,the ultimate sentence. The bold christian women, the braveAmerican wives and daughters of half a century ago are honoured,while the intrepid moralists of the present day, worthy of theirgrandmothers, are made the confessors and martyrs of their age.
I could cite many conversations and incidents to show how themorals of women are crushed: but I can make room for only one.Let it be the following. A lady, who is considered unusuallyclear-headed and sound-hearted where trying questions are notconcerned, one day praised very highly Dr. Channing's work onSlavery. "But," said she, "do not you think it apity that so much is said on slavery just now?"
"No. I think it necessary and natural."
"But people who hold Dr. Channing's belief about a futurelife, cannot well make out the case of the slaves to be so verybad an one. If the present life is but a moment in comparisonwith the eternity to come, can it matter so very much how itis spent?"
"How does it strike you about your own children? Would itreconcile you to their being made slaves, that they could be soonly for three-score years and ten?"
"O no. But yet it seems as if life would so soon beover."
"And what do you think of their condition at the end ofit? How much will the purposes of human life have beenfurfilled?"
"The slaves will not be punished, you know, for the statethey may be in; for it will be no fault of their own. Theirmasters will have the responsibility; not they."
"Place the responsibility where you will. Speakingaccording to your own belief, do you think it of no consequencewhether a human being enters upon a future life utterly ignorantand sensualised, or in the likeness of Dr. Channing, as youdescribed him just now?"
"Of great consequence, certainly. But then it is nobusiness of ours; of us women, at all events."
"I thought you considered yourself a Christian."
"So I do. You will say that Christians should helpsufferers, whoever and wherever they may be. But not women, inall cases, surely."
"Where, in your Christianity, do you find the distinctionmade?"
She could only reply that she thought women should confinethemselves to doing what could be done at home. I asked her whather christian charity would bid her do, if she saw a great boybeating a little one in the street.
"O, I parted two such the other day in the street. Itwould have been very wrong to have passed them by."
"Well: if there are a thousand strong men in the southbeating ten thousand weak slaves, and you can possibly help tostop the beating by a declaration of your opinion upon it, doesnot your christian duty oblige you to make such a declaration,whether you are man or woman? What in the world has yourwomanhood to do with it ?"
How fearfully the morals of woman are crushed, appears fromthe prevalent persuasion that there are virtues which arepeculiarly masculine, and others which are peculiarly feminine.It is amazing that a society which makes a most emphaticprofession of its Christianity, should almost universallyentertain such a fallacy: and not see that, in the case theysuppose, instead of the character of Christ being the meetingpoint of all virtues, there would have been a separate gospel forwomen, and a second company of agents for its diffusion. It isnot only that masculine and feminine employments are supposed tobe properly different. No one in the world, I believe, questionsthis. But it is actually supposed that what are called the hardyvirtues are more appropriate to men, and the gentler to women. Asall virtues nourish each other, and can no otherwise benourished, the consequence of the admitted fallacy is that menare, after all, not nearly so brave as they ought to be; norwomen so gentle. But what is the manly character till it begentle? The very word magnanimity cannot be thought of inrelation to it till it becomes mild--Christ-like. Again, what cana woman be, or do, without bravery? Has she not to struggle withthe toils and difficulties which follow upon the mere possessionof a mind? Must she not face physical and moral pain--physicaland moral danger? Is there a day of her life in which there arenot conflicts wherein no one can help her--perilous work to bedone, in which she can have neither sympathy nor aid? Let herlean upon man as much as he will, how much is it that he can dofor her?--from how much can he protect her? From a few physicalperils, and from a very few social evils. This is all. Over themoral world he has no control, except on his own account; and itis the moral life of human beings which is all in all. He canneither secure any women from pain and grief, nor rescue her fromthe strife of emotions, nor prevent the film of life fromcracking under her feet with every step she treads, nor hide fromher the abyss which is beneath, nor save her from sinking into itat last alone. Wllile it is so, while woman is human, men shouldbeware how they deprive her of any of the strength which is allneeded for the strife and burden of humanity. Let them beware howthey put her off her watch and defence, by promises which theycannot fulfil;--promises of a guardianship which can arise onlyfrom within; of support which can be derived only from the freestmoral action,--from the self-reliance which can be generated byno other means.
But, it may be asked, how does society get on,-- what does itdo? for it acts on the supposition of there being masculine andfeminine virtues,--upon the fallacy just exposed.
It does so; and the consequences are what might be looked for.Men are ungentle, tyrannical. They abuse the right of thestrongest, however they may veil the abuse with indulgence. Theywant the magnanimity to discern woman's human rights; and theycrush her morals rather than allow them. Women are, as might beanticipated, weak, ignorant and subservient, in as far as theyexchange self-reliance for reliance on anything out ofthemselves. Those who will not submit to such a suspension oftheir moral functions, (for the work of self-perfection remainsto be done, sooner or later,) have to suffer for their allegianceto duty. They have all the need of bravery that the few heroicmen who assert the highest rights of women have of gentleness, toguard them from the encroachment to which power, custom, andeducation, incessantly conduce.
Such brave women and such just men there are in the UnitedStates, scattered among the multitude, whose false apprehensionof rights leads to an enormous failure of duties. There areenough of such to commend the true understanding and practice tothe simplest minds and most faithful hearts of the community,under whose testimony the right principle will spread andflourish. If it were not for the external prosperity of thecountry, the injured half of its society would probably obtainjustice sooner than in any country of Europe. But the prosperityof America is a circumstance unfavourable to its women. It willbe long before they are put to the proof as to what they arecapable of thinking and doing: a proof to which hundreds, perhapsthousands of Englishwomen have been put by adversity, and theresult of which is a remarkable improvement in their socialcondition, even within the space of ten years. Persecution foropinion, punishment for all manifestations of intellectual andmoral strength, are still as common as women who have opinionsand who manifest strength: but some things are easy, and many arepossible of achievement, to women of ordinary powers, which itwould have required genius to accomplish but a few years ago.
From Harriet Martineau, Society in America, VolumeIII, Part III, Chapter II, "Woman." London: Saundersand Otley, 1837, pp. 105-118.
Forward to Society in America, VolumeIII, Part III, Chapter II, Section I, "Marriage."
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