of divine wisdom in all things else to suppose that the powers of each
were not peculiarly fitted for their own appropriate sphere. Woman gains
nothing--she always loses when she leaves her own sphere for that of
man. When she forsakes the household and the gentler duties of domestic
life for the labors of the field, the pulpit, the rostrum, the
court-room, she always descends from her own bright station, and
invariably fails to ascend that of man. She falls between the two; and
the world gazes at her as not exactly a woman, not quite a man,
perplexed in what category of natural history to classify her. This
remark holds specially true as you ascend from savage to refined
society, where the rights and duties of women have been most fully
recognized and most accurately defined. Mind is not to be weighed in
scales. It must be judged by its _uses_ and its _influence_. And who
that compasses the peculiar purpose of woman's life; who that
understands the meaning of those good old Saxon words, mother, sister,
wife, daughter; who that estimates aright the duties they involve, the
influences they embody in giving character to all of human kind, will
hesitate to place her intellect, with its quickness, delicacy and
persuasiveness, as high in the scale of power as that of the father,
husband and son? If we estimate her mind by its actual power of
influence when she is permitted to fill to the best advantage her circle
of action, we shall find a capacity for education equal to that of him
who, merely in reference to the temporary relations of society, has been
constituted her lord. If you look up into yonder firmament with your
naked eye, the astronomer will point you to a star which shines down
upon you single in rays of pure liquid light. But if you will ascend yon
eminence and direct towards it that magnificent instrument which modern
science has brought to such perfection of power, the same star will
suddenly resolve itself into two beautiful luminaries, equal in
brilliancy, equal in all stellar excellence, emitting rays of different