prise; so that she bids
fair to become as self-supporting, independent, and intelligent as she
desires. It is true that much is still said of the jealousy and
selfishness of men, leading them to monopolize most of the sources of
profitable effort to their own use, thus cramping the sphere of woman,
and making her dependent and isolated.

Now, it is very much a question with me whether, after all, the failure,
so far, to secure these fancied rights, is not quite as much the result
of woman's backwardness and inefficiency as of man's jealous and greedy
monopoly; whether the greatest obstacle does not lie in the adverse
opinions prevailing among women themselves. According to my observation,
as fast as women have proved themselves adapted to compete with men in
any particular field, their brothers have forthwith striven to make the
path easy and pleasant for them.

But there is a natural and necessary jealousy excited when women attempt
to go out of the beaten track, and establish new conditions and
resources for themselves--a jealousy which has its source in the
instinctive feeling of civilized society, that the standard of womanhood
must not be lowered; that its safety and progressive well-being depend
upon the immaculate preservation of that pure and graceful ideal of
womanhood which every true man wishes to see guarded with a vestal
precision. And society will pause, thoughtfully to consider, before the
stamp of its approbation is affixed to any mode of development by which
that lofty ideal would suffer. Anything which tends in the least to
unsex, to unsphere woman, by so much works with a reflex influence on
man and on society, and produces in both a gradual and dangerous
deterioration. And self-preservation is the first instinct of society as
well as of the individual being. Man, and the eternal and infinite order
of the world, require that woman keep her proper place, and that she
demand nothing which, granted, would introduce confusion and disorder
among the social forces.

But it is not so much of woman's rights that I would speak. I am not
afraid but that she will possess these in due time, as fast as her
nature and true place and mission in the world come to be more fully
understood. I am far more anxious that she should come into such more
perfect understanding.

Woman has always been a puzzle, an enigma, to man. When, in the pride of
his anatomical skill, he has essayed to make her his study, thinking to