It is the height of
selfishness for men, who fully appreciate in their on Lase the great
advantages of a good education to deny these advantages to women. There is no valid
argument by which the exclusion of the female sex from the privilege of education
can he defended. It is argued that women have their domestic duties to perform,
and that, if they were educated. They would bury themselves in their books and
have little time for attending to the management of their households. Of course
it is possible for women, as it is for men, to neglect necessary work in order
to spare more time for reading sensational novels. But women are no more liable
to this temptation than men, and most women would be able to do their household
work the entire better for being able to refresh their minds in the intervals
of leisure with a little reading. Nay, Education would even help them in the
performance of the narrowest sphere of womanly duty. for education involves
knowledge of the means by which health may be preserved and improved, and
enables a mother to consult such modern books as ill tell her how to rear up
her children into healthy men and women. and skillfully nurse them and her
husband when disease attacks her household. Without education she will be not
unlikely to listen with fatal results to the advice of superstitious quacks. Who
pretend to work wonders by charms and magic.
But according to a higher
conception of woman’s sphere, woman ought to be something more than a household
drudge. She ought to be able not merely to nurse her husband in sickness, but
also to be his companion in health. For this part of her wifely duty education
is necessary, for there cannot well be congenial companionship between an
educated man and an undulated life. Who can converse with her husband on no
higher subjects than cookery and servants wages. Also one of a mother’s highest
duties is the education of her children at the time when their mind is most amenable
to instruction. A child’s whole future life, to a large extent, depends on the
teaching it receives in early childhood, and it is needless to say that this
first foundation of education cannot be well laid by an ignorant mother. On all
these grounds female education is a vital necessity.
But it is sometimes urged
that the intellect of women is so weak as to be incapable of receiving and
benefiting by any but the lowest form of education. Such an assertion could
hardly be made by any one who considers for a moment the instances afforded by
history of women who have shown conspicuous ability in statesmanship. Literature,
science. And art the list of women who have by their intellectual power won for
themselves an eminent position in history is a long one. And would be still
longer if in the past they had enjoyed the same educational advantages as were given to men.
The only real danger to
be apprehended from female education arises from an imperfect views of the
scope of education. If education is confined to mere book learning, there is a
danger that women may, from physical weakness, succumb to the intellectual
strain put upon them in their studies at college and college. The remedy far
this is to remember that physical training is an essential part of education. And
to allow women the opportunity of strengthening their physical powers by
regular exercise. Especially by exercise in the open air, so that they have the
good health necessary for the profitable prosecution at their studies.