n, she also has a fearful power to corrupt and
deprave man. On the other hand, to quote old Antisthenes once more, "the
virtues of the man and woman are the same." A refined man is more refined
than a coarse woman. A child-loving man is infinitely tenderer and sweeter
toward children than a hard and unsympathetic woman. The very qualities
that are claimed as distinctively feminine are possessed more abundantly by
many men than by many of what is called the softer sex.

Why is it necessary to say all this? Because there is always danger that we
who believe in the equality of the sexes should be led into
over-statements, which will react against ourselves. It is not safe to say
that the ballot-box would be reformed if intrusted to feminine votes
alone. Had the voters of the South been all women, it would have plunged
earlier into the gulf of secession, dived deeper, and come up even more
reluctantly. Were the women of Spain to rule its destinies unchecked, the
Pope would be its master, and the Inquisition might be reestablished. For
all that we can see, the rule of women alone would be as bad as the rule of
men alone. It would be as unsafe to give women the absolute control of man
as to make man the master of woman.

Let us be a shade more cautious in our reasonings. Woman needs equal
rights, not because she is man's better half, but because she is his other
half. She needs them, not as an angel, but as a fraction of humanity. Her
political education will not merely help man, but it will help herself. She
will sometimes be right in her opinions, and sometimes be altogether wrong;
but she will learn, as man learns, by her own blunders. The demand in her
behalf is that she shall have the opportunity to make mistakes, since it is
by that means she must become wise.

In all our towns there is a tendency toward "mixed schools." We rarely hear
of the sexes being separated in a school after being once united; but we
constantly hear of their being brought together after separation. This
union is commonly, but mistakenly, recommended as an advantage to the boys
alone. I once heard an accomplished teacher remonstrate against this
change, when thus urged. "Why should my girls be sacrificed," she said,
"to improve your boys?" Six months after, she had learned by experience.
"Why," she asked, "did you rest the argument on so narrow a ground? Since
my school consisted half of boys, I find with surprise that the change
has improved bot