“The presidents and professors of your educational
institutions,—do they share the common
belief as to woman’s mission?”
“Oh, yes! They all say that the chief business
of woman is to train up her children.”
(Philosopher’s solo.)
“There seems to be blindness and stupidity somewhere
among these people. From what they say of the
difficulty of bringing up their children, it must
take an archangel to do it rightly; still they do
not think a woman who is married and settles down to
family life needs much education! Moreover, in
educating young women, that which is universally acknowledged
to be the chief business of their lives receives not
the least attention.”
If our philosopher continued his inquiries into the
manners and customs of our country, he must have felt
greatly encouraged; for he would have found that it
is only in this one direction that we show such blindness
and stupidity. He would have found that in every
other occupation we demand preparation. The individual
who builds our ships, cuts our coats, manufactures
our watches, superintends our machinery, takes charge
of our cattle, our trees, our flowers, must know how,
must have been especially prepared for his calling.
It is only character-moulding, only shaping the destinies
of immortal beings, for which we demand neither preparation
nor a knowledge of the business. It is only of
our children that we are resigned to lose nearly one-fourth
by death, “owing to ignorance and injudicious
nursery management.” Were this rate of
mortality declared to exist among our domestic animals,
the community would be aroused at once.
CULTURE PROVED TO BE A NEED OF THE CHILD-TRAINER.
Perhaps some day the community may come to perceive
that woman requires for her vocation what the teacher,
the preacher, the lawyer, and the physician, require
for theirs; namely, special preparation and general
culture. The first, because every vocation demands
special preparation; and the second, because, to satisfy
the requirements of young minds, she will need to
draw from almost every kind of knowledge. And
we must remember here, that the advantages derived
from culture are not wholly an intellectual gain.
We get from hooks and other sources of culture not
merely what informs the mind, but that which warms
the heart, quickens the sympathies, strengthens the
understanding; get clearness and breadth of vision,
get refining and ennobling influences, get wisdom
in its truest and most comprehensive sense; and all
of these, the last more than all, a mother needs for
her high calling. That it is a high calling, we
have high authority to show. Dr. Channing says,
“No office can compare in importance with that
of training a child.” Yet the office is
assumed without preparation.
Herbert Spencer asks, in view of this omission, “What
is to be expected when one of the most intricate of
problems is undertaken by those who have given scarcely
a thought as to the principles on which its solution
depends? Is the unfolding of a human being so
simple a process that any one may superintend and
regulate it with no preparation whatever?...
Is it not madness to make no provision for such a
task?”
