thirty-six years, full seven-tenths of my services have been
devoted to women who, had they been properly instructed in
the science of life, and careful to obey those instructions,
would not have needed one-seventh of those services, while
they would have prevented six-sevenths of their sickness,
suffering and loss of time, and a like proportion of the
expenses of doctoring, nursing, medicines, etc., etc.
_Second_: They can make a far better and more profitable use
of this knowledge than men can, because they can better
appreciate the liabilities, sufferings and wants of their
sex, which are far more numerous and imperative than ours;
and they are always with us, from infancy to boyhood and
womanhood, to watch us and protect us from injury, and to
relieve us promptly from the sufferings that may afflict us,
as well as to teach us how to avoid them. _Third_: Their
intellectual power to learn principles is as great as ours,
their perceptions are quicker than ours, their sympathies
are more tender and persistent, and their watchfulness and
patient perseverance with the sick are untiring. I regard
the teaching and practice of the science of life as woman's
peculiarly appropriate sphere. Its value to the family of
the wife and the mother, is beyond estimation in dollars and
cents, by the husband and father. No money that he can
properly spend to secure it to his daughters, should be
otherwise appropriated; for, should they never enter the
family relation, it will be a means of escape from sickness
mortification and expense to themselves, and of useful and
honorable subsistence, not only priceless in its possession,
but totally inalienable by any reverses of fortune. The
possession of this knowledge from their infancy up, would do
more to prevent their becoming poor and "friendless," than
do all the alms houses for the former, and "homes" for the
latter that society can build, while it would cost less to
each individual than does an elegant modern piano. Forty
years ago your speaker obtained from the legislature of Ohio
a liberal university charter under the title of "The