n't
belong to women." Then there was but one college in the world
where women were admitted, and that was in Brazil. I would have
found my way there, but by the time I was prepared to go, one was
opened in the young State of Ohio--the first in the United States
where women and negroes could enjoy opportunities with white men.
I was disappointed when I came to seek a profession worthy an
immortal being--every employment was closed to me, except those
of the teacher, the seamstress, and the housekeeper. In
education, in marriage, in religion, in everything,
disappointment is the lot of woman. It shall be the business of
my life to deepen this disappointment in every woman's heart
until she bows down to it no longer. I wish that women, instead
of being walking show-cases, instead of begging of their fathers
and brothers the latest and gayest new bonnet, would ask of them
their rights.

The question of Woman's Rights is a practical one. The notion has
prevailed that it was only an ephemeral idea; that it was but
women claiming the right to smoke cigars in the streets, and to
frequent bar-rooms. Others have supposed it a question of
comparative intellect; others still, of sphere. Too much has
already been said and written about woman's sphere. Trace all the
doctrines to their source and they will be found to have no basis
except in the usages and prejudices of the age. This is seen in
the fact that what is tolerated in woman in one country is not
tolerated in another. In this country women may hold
prayer-meetings, etc., but in Mohammedan countries it is written
upon their mosques, "Women and dogs, and other impure animals,
are not permitted to enter." Wendell Phillips says, "The best and
greatest thing one is capable of doing, that is his sphere." I
have confidence in the Father to believe that when He gives us
the capacity to do anything He does not make a blunder. Leave
women, then, to find their sphere. And do not tell us before we
are born even, that our province is to cook dinners, darn
stockings, and sew on buttons. We are told woman has all the
rights she wants; and even women, I am ashamed to say, tell us
so. They mistake the politeness of men for rights--seats while
men stand in this hall to-night, and their adulations; but these