oved, it
were impossible, I believe, to decide; and, if we could, we have gained
little by the decision; for we could neither give it to our children,
nor to ourselves. But of this we may be certain: that individual, of
whatever intellectual character, is the happiest, the most useful, and
the most beloved of God, if not of men, who has best subserved the
purposes of Heaven in her creation and endowment; who has most carefully
turned to good the faculties she has; most cautiously guarded against
the evils to which her propensities incline; most justly estimated, and
conscientiously fulfilled, the duties appropriate to her circumstance
and character.

INFLUENCE OF CHRISTIANITY ON WOMAN.

The abject condition of the female sex, in all, out of Christian
countries, is universally known and admitted. In all savage and pagan
tribes, the severest burdens of physical toil are laid upon their
shoulders; they are chiefly valued for the same reason that men value
their most useful animals, or as objects of their sensual and selfish
desires. Even in the learned and dignified forms of Eastern paganism,
"the wife," says one who has spent seventeen years among them, "is the
slave, rather than the companion of her husband. She is not allowed to
walk with him, she must walk _behind_ him; not to eat with him, she must
eat _after_ him, and eat of what he leaves. She must not sleep until he
is asleep, nor remain asleep after he is awake. If she is sitting, and
he comes in, she should rise up. She should, say their sacred books,
have no other god on earth than her husband. Him she should worship
while he lives, and, when he dies, she should be burnt with him. As the
widow, in case she is not burnt, is not allowed to marry again, is often
considered little better than an outcast, and not unfrequently sinks
into gross vice, her life can scarcely be considered a blessing."

The same author remarks, that "there is little social intercourse
between the sexes; little or no acquaintance of the parties before
marriage, and consequently little mutual attachment; and as there is an
absolute vacuity and darkness in the minds of the females, who are not
allowed even to learn to read, there is no solid foundation laid for
domestic happiness."

If we pass into the dominions of the crescent, we find the condition of
females, in some respects, rather worse, it would seem, than better.
For, in pagan India, debased and abused as woman is, she is