of action, than was allotted to her in historic Greece."

Lecky, in his "European Morals," says: "It is one of the most remarkable
and, to some writers, one of the most perplexing facts in the moral
history of Greece, that in the former and ruder period women had
undoubtedly the highest place, and their type exhibited the highest
perfection." What the "highest perfection" is, for her type, or for man's
type, is not here under discussion; but it is not out of place to say in
passing that if the final conquest of the spiritual over the material
forces of humanity is really the aim of civilization, these "facts in the
moral history of Greece" become less "perplexing."

The heroines of Homer's tales were all of noble birth--they were
goddesses, princesses, hereditary gentlewomen. In early historic times,
also, it was only royal or gentle blood that secured for woman political
power. Athena was, in gentle Athens, patroness of household arts; but in
Sparta, as Minerva, the same divinity was goddess, not of political
interests, as Mrs. Dietrick puts it, but of war. She sprang full-armed
from the head of Jove--rather a masculine origin, it must be owned. In
Sparta women became soldiers as the democratic idea advanced. Princess
Archidamia, marching at the head of her female troop to rebuke the
senators for the decree that the women and children be removed from the
city before the anticipated attack could come, is an example. In Etolia,
in Argos, and in other states, the same was true. Maria and Telesilla led
the women in battle and disciplined them in peace. But the world does not
turn to Sparta for its ideal of a pre-Christian republic, and the
Suffragists of our day do not propose to emulate the Spartan Amazon and
hew their way to political power with the sword.

In Athens, which does present the model, matters were far otherwise. In