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PAGE

INTRODUCTORY, 7

IDEALS, 16

THINGS AS THEY ARE, 38

THINGS AS THEY MIGHT BE, 72

PROFESSIONAL AND DOMESTIC LIFE, 98

SPECIFIC SUGGESTIONS, 130

CONCLUSION, 164

INTRODUCTORY.

In any inquiry of a practical nature, intended to lead to some definite course of action, it is obviously necessary to start with a tolerably clear idea of the end in view--the object for which it is proposed to provide. In the case of education, definitions more or less satisfactory have already so often been given, that it might seem superfluous to go into the question again. As a matter of practice, however, it is found that, when it is attempted to apply the received definitions of the general objects of education to the case of women, they are usually questioned or modified, if not altogether set aside. When, for instance, Mr Maurice tells us that 'the end of education itself is, as it has always been considered, to form a nation of living, orderly men,' the definition will be accepted, with the tacit reservation that it applies only to men, in the exclusive sense of the word, and has nothing to do with the education of women. Again, when Milton, in his treatise on Education, lays down that the end of learning is 'to repair the ruin of our first parents by regaining to know God aright, and out of that knowledge to love Him, to imitate Him, to be like Him,' the language might be taken in a general sense; and when he goes on to define a complete and generous education as 'that which fits a man to perform justly, skilfully, and magnanimously all the offices, both private and public, of peace and war,' the words might still, perhaps, bear a common interpretation; but as soon as he comes to describing in detail, 'how all this may be done between twelve and one-and-twenty,' it becomes evident that he is thinking of boys only. In the most recent writers, the tendency to regard general theories of education as applying exclusively to that of men, is quite as strongly marked.

It seems, therefore, that in attempting to treat of female education, it is necessary once more to ask what we are aiming at, and to obtain, if possible, a clear understanding and agreement as to the end in view. What ought the educators of girls to be trying to make of them? What is the ideal towards which they ought to direct their efforts, the end to be desired as the result of their labours?

To these questions we shall probably receive one or other of two answers. Many persons will reply, without hesitation, that the one object to be aimed at, the ideal to be striven after, in the education of women, is to make good wives and mothers. And the answer is a reasonable one, so far as it goes, and with explanations. Clearly, no education would be good which did not tend to make good wives and mothers; and that which produces the best wives and mothers is likely to be the best possible education. But, having made this admission, it is necessary to point out that an education of which the aim is thus limited, is likely to fail in that aim. That this is so will appear when the definition is transferred to the education of men. It will be admitted that a system of education which should produce bad husbands and fathers would prove itself to be bad; and an education which produces the best husbands and fathers is likely to be in all respects the best; because the best man in any capacity must be the man who can measure most accurately the proportion of all his duties and claims, giving to each its due share of his time and energy. A man will not be the better husband and father for neglecting his obligations as a citizen, or as a man of business. Nor will a woman be the better wife or mother through ignorance or disregard of other responsibilities. There is, indeed, a view of male education which, having worldly advancement for its ultimate object, regards it exclusively as a means of acquiring professional dexterity; but such a conception of the purposes of education--however legitimate, in a limited and subordinate sense--when elevated into the position of the final goal, must be looked upon rather as a lapse from a higher standard, than as a principle deliberately maintained by any high-minded and thoughtful person. In disinterested schemes of male education, it is usually assumed, as a matter of course, that the great object is to make the best of a man in every respect, leaving him to adapt himself to specific relations, according to the state of life into which it shall please God to call him.

A similar idea seems to underlie the other, and more comprehensive reply, which will probably be given to our inquiry, namely, that the object of female education is to produce women of the best and highest type, not limited by exclusive regard to any specific functions hereafter to be discharged by them. This answer at once brings down upon us the terrible question, What is the best and highest type of woman? And as this question lies at the root of the whole matter, it cannot be passed by. Many people, indeed, talk as if it was a matter on which the world had long since made up its mind, and which might be assumed to be already decided. But when we ask what it is that the world has decided, it is difficult to obtain anything like a clear and unanimous answer. The ideal differs not only among different races, and in different ages, but most widely in our own country, and in modern times. Unanimity is scarcely to be found in any class of writers or thinkers, though on this point, of all others, some sort of agreement, at least between parents and teachers, would seem to be most essential. It may perhaps be of service, as a step towards a mutual understanding, to examine, though necessarily in a very imperfect and cursory manner, some of the most commonly received notions current on the subject.

IDEALS.

The general acceptance of the theory is not surprising. It gratifies the logical instinct; and many persons, hastily taking for granted that it is the only conception of the relations between men and women which recognises real distinctions, assume it to be the only one which satisfies the craving of the aesthetic sense for harmony and fitness. Unfortunately it is not workable. We make the world even more puzzling than it is by nature, when we shut our eyes to the facts of daily life; and we know, as a fact, that women have a part in the world, and that men are by no means ciphers in the home circle--we know that a man who should be all head would be as monstrous an anomaly as a woman all heart--that men require the protection of law, and women are not so uniformly prosperous as to be independent of comfort and consolation--men have no monopoly of working, nor women of weeping. The sort of distinction it is attempted to establish, though not without an element of truth when rightly understood, is for the most part artificial, plausible in appearance, but breaking down under the test of experience. When overstrained, and made the foundation of a divided moral code, it is misleading in proportion to its attractiveness.

Happily this theory, though deeply and widely and most subtilely influential, is not completely dominant. People who go to church, and who read their Bibles, are perpetually reminded of one type and exemplar, one moral law. The theory of education of our English Church recognises no distinction of sex. The baptized child is signed with the sign of the cross, 'in token that hereafter he--or she--shall not be ashamed to confess the faith of Christ crucified, and manfully to fight under His banner, against sin, the world, and the devil; and to continue Christ's faithful soldier and servant to his--or her--life's end.' The sponsors are charged to provide that the child be 'virtuously brought up to lead a godly and a Christian life, remembering always that baptism doth represent unto us our profession, which is to follow the example of our Saviour Christ, and to be made like unto Him.' The catechism in which the child is to be instructed, gives no hint of separate standards of duty. The catechumens are required to give an account of their duty towards God and towards their neighbour. The latter supplies a statement of social obligations, in which, if anywhere, we should surely find a distinction laid down between the duties of men and those of women. But no such distinction appears. In Confirmation, the children, having come to years of discretion, ratify and confirm in their own persons what has gone before, still without a hint of divergent duties. The same principle appears in the formularies of the Scotch Church. The Shorter Catechism teaches that 'God created man, male and female, after His own image, in knowledge, righteousness, and holiness, with dominion over the creatures;' and that 'man's chief end is to glorify God, and to enjoy Him for ever.'

Here all is clear and consistent. Thoroughly to carry out the Christian theory would no doubt lead to some startling consequences; but the theory itself is intelligible and workable. Can the same be said of any other of the standards or tests by which educators might shape their work? The only intelligible principle on which modern writers show anything like unanimity, is that women are intended to supply, and ought to be made, something which men want. What that may be, it is not easy to discover. We are met at the outset by a difficulty as to the nature of the want. We may want what we like, or we may want what will do us good--and the two qualities are not always combined. Usually, however, it is taken for granted that, in this case, men like what is good for them; and it only remains, therefore, to be ascertained what it is that they like.

There is no lack of evidence. English literature is full of oracular information on the subject. Mr Anthony Trollope says: 'We like women to be timid.' Mr Helps complains that 'women are not taught to be courageous. Indeed, to some persons courage may seem as unnecessary for women as Latin and Greek. Yet there are few things that would tend to make women happier in themselves, and more acceptable to those with whom they live, than courage.... So far from courage being unfeminine, there is a peculiar grace and dignity in those beings who have little active power of attack or defence, passing through danger with a moral courage which is equal to that of the strongest.'

Abundance of applause has been bestowed upon Miss Nightingale and the other 'heroines of the Crimea,' whose enterprise certainly required no small share of masculine resolution. On the other hand, a writer on the position of women confesses to 'an admiration for the commonplace, unambitious kind of old maid, who is content to do good in her own neighbourhood, and among the few persons whom she really knows--who takes a lively interest in the welfare of her nephews and nieces, and who regales herself occasionally with tea and gossip.'

One writer tells us that there are things for which women are exclusively fitted. 'In the first place, women have the power of pleasing. Accomplishments are cultivated as instrumental to the successful exercise of this power, and therefore are not to be rejected on the ground that they waste the time that might be given to mathematics. The common sense of the world has long ago settled that men are to be pleased, and women are to please. Accordingly women acquire an agreeable expertness at the piano, and view the acquisition as a solemn duty.' Another, in answer to the question, what ought all young ladies to learn, says, 'Accomplishments are quite a secondary matter. If men do not get tired of the songs, they soon get tired of the singer, if she can do nothing but sing. What is really wanted in a woman is, that she should be a permanently pleasant companion. So far as education can give or enhance pleasantness, it does so by making the view of life wide, the wit ready, the faculty of comprehension vivid.'

One authority, delightfully contented with things as they are, assures us that, 'humanly speaking, the best sort of British young lady is all that a woman can be expected to be--civil, intelligent, enthusiastic, decorous, and, as a rule, prettier than in any other country. We are perfectly satisfied with what we have got.' Another, less happily constituted, asserts that 'all good judges and good teachers lament the present system of girls' education. It is all cramming, and with such very poor results. After all is over, girls know very little and care about less. Most girls are decidedly stupid, and what good can cramming of the most barren and repulsive kind do to stupid girls? We should consider what we want women to be. That they should be trained to be good and generous is by far the first thing.... The next thing is that they should be well-mannered and healthy. The third requisite is, that they should know how to express themselves--should have a right standard in judging books and men, and public and private life.... The fourth requisite is, that they should know how to bear rule in a household.... These are all the essentials.'

'He who toils all day, And comes home hungry, tired or cold, And feels 'twould do him good to scold His wife a little, let him trust Her love, and boldly be unjust, And not care till she cries! How prove In any other way his love Till soothed in mind by meat and rest? If, after that, she's well caress'd, And told how good she is to bear His humour, fortune makes it fair. Women like men to be like men, That is, at least, just now and then!'

The wife is here represented as rejoicing in her husband's ill-temper, as affording her an opportunity of dispelling it by soothing arts, a practical illustration, it may be observed, of the complementary theory, the woman's patience actually demanding a man's sulkiness to practise upon. Contrast Mr Patmore's 'Jane' with Mr Tennyson's 'Isabel.'

'Eyes not down-dropt nor over-bright, but fed With the clear-pointed flame of chastity, Clear, without heat, undying, tended by Pure vestal thoughts in the translucent fane Of her still spirit; locks not wide-dispread, Madonna-wise on either side her head; Sweet lips whereon perpetually did reign The summer calm of golden charity, Were fixed shadows of thy fixed mood, Revered Isabel, the crown and head, The stately flower of female fortitude, Of perfect wifehood and pure lowlihead.

'The intuitive decision of a bright And thorough-edged intellect to part Error from crime; a prudence to withhold; The laws of marriage character'd in gold Upon the blanched tablets of her heart; A love still burning upward, giving light To read those laws; an accent very low In blandishment, but a most silver flow Of subtle-paced counsel in distress, Right to the heart and brain, though undescried, Winning its way with extreme gentleness Through all the outworks of suspicious pride; A courage to endure and to obey; A hate of gossip parlance, and of sway, Crown'd Isabel, through all her placid life, The queen of marriage, a most perfect wife.'

The self-defence which Shakespeare puts into the mouth of Queen Katherine describes a different type:--

'Heaven witness I have been to you a true and humble wife, At all times to your will conformable; Ever in fear to kindle your dislike, Yea, subject to your countenance; glad or sorry, As I saw it incline. When was the hour I ever contradicted your desire, Or made it not mine too? or which of your friends Have I not strove to love, although I knew He were mine enemy? what friend of mine That had to him derived your anger, did I Continue in my liking? nay, gave notice He was from thence discharged?'

These are but a few samples, culled almost at random from the mass of contradictory evidence to be found in English literature. Conceive a governess or schoolmistress, duly impressed with the obligation of training her pupils to be accomplished pleasers of men, and trying to fashion for them a model out of such materials! Must not the result be simply blank despair? The same conclusion might be reached by a shorter process. Men are supposed to marry the sort of women they like. But looking upon the infinite variety of wives to be met with in society, could any one generalise from them a model wife, who might serve as a pattern to educators? Would any man wish for a wife so modelled? Might it not be as well to abandon this distracting theory--to discard the shifting standard of opinion, and to fall back upon the old doctrine which teaches educators to seek in every human soul for that divine image which it is their work to call out and to develope?

The educational question depends, as we have seen, on the larger question of women's place in the social order. Are they to be regarded, and to regard themselves, primarily as children of God, members of Christ, and heirs of the kingdom of heaven, and, secondarily, as wives, mothers, daughters, sisters? or are the family relationships to overshadow the divine and the social, and to be made the basis of a special moral code, applying to women only? According to the first view, all human duties--everything that is lovely and of good report--all moral virtues and all Christian graces are inculcated and enforced by the highest sanctions. An ascetic contempt for wifely and motherly and daughterly ties is no part of the Christian ideal. But the view which teaches women to think of family claims as embracing their whole duty--which bids them choose to serve man rather than God--sets before them a standard of obligation which, in proportion as it is exclusively adhered to, vitiates not their lives only, but those of the men on whom their influence might be of a far different sort. That such a theory is radically inconsistent with the divine order might easily be shown. That its action on society is profoundly demoralising is a lesson taught by mournful experience.

THINGS AS THEY ARE.

Is this reasonable? Apart from immediate pecuniary necessity, is it desirable that the regular education of women should be considered as finished at the age of eighteen? If we are to take the almost universal practice as an answer, it is a very decided affirmative. Even girls whose parents must be fully aware that they will eventually have to maintain themselves, seldom receive any adequate training for their future work. Those whose fathers intend to provide for them, are still less likely to be supposed to want any further education after they leave school.

So fixed and wide-spread a custom must have had, at some time or other, even if it has not now, a meaning and a justification. And this may perhaps be found in the fact that our mothers and our grandmothers were accustomed to undergo at home, after leaving school, what was in fact an apprenticeship to household management. It seems indeed at one time to have been customary to apprentice girls of what we now call the middle class, to trades,--as we find George Herbert urging his Country Parson not to put his children 'into vain trades and unbefitting the reverence of their father's calling, such as are taverns for men and lacemaking for women,'--but even where there was no apprenticeship to a specific business, the round of household labours would supply a very considerable variety of useful occupation. An active part in these labours would naturally devolve upon the daughters of the house, who would thus be forming habits of industry and order invaluable in after life.

Probably a great many fathers, profoundly ignorant as they are of the lives of women, cherish a vague imagination that the same kind of thing is going on still. If Providence should at any time lead them to spend a week in the society of their daughters, under ordinary circumstances--not when illness has altered the usual current of affairs--they would find that this is very far from being the case. That great male public, which spends its days in chambers and offices and shops, knows little of what is going on at home. Writers in newspapers and magazines are fond of talking about the nursery, as if every household contained a never-ending supply of young children, on whom the grown-up daughters might be practising the art of bringing up. Others have a great deal to say about the kitchen, assuming it to be desirable that the ladies of the house should supersede, or at least assist, the cook. In that case, where there is a mother with two or three daughters, we should have four or five cooks. The undesirableness of such a multiplication of artists need scarcely be pointed out. Needlework, again, occupies a much larger space in the imagination of writers than it does in practical life. Except in families where there are children, there is very little plain needlework to be done, and what there is, many people make a point of giving out, on the ground that it is better to pay a half-starved needlewoman for work done, than to give her the money in the form of alms.

Having mentioned needlework, cookery, and the care of children, we seem to have come to an end of the household work in which ladies are supposed to take part. If young women of eighteen and upwards are learning anything in their daily life at home, it must be something beside and beyond the acquirement of dexterity in ordinary domestic arts.

Many fathers, however, are no doubt aware that their daughters have very little to do. But that seems to them anything but a hardship. They wish they had a little less to do themselves, and can imagine all sorts of interesting pursuits to which they would betake themselves if only they had a little more leisure. Ladies, it may be said, have their choice, and they must evidently prefer idleness, or they would find something to do. If this means that half-educated young women do not choose steady work when they have no inducement whatever to overcome natural indolence, it is no doubt true. Women are not stronger-minded than men, and a commonplace young woman can no more work steadily without motive or discipline than a commonplace young man. It has been remarked that 'the active, voluntary part of man is very small, and if it were not economised by a sleepy kind of habit, its results would be null. We could not do every day out of our own heads all we have to do. We should accomplish nothing; for all our energies would be frittered away in minor attempts at petty improvement.' The case of young women could scarcely have been better stated. Every day they have to do out of their own heads nearly all that they have to do. They accomplish little; for their energies are frittered away in minor attempts at petty improvement.

How true this is, the friends and counsellors of girls could abundantly testify. There is no point on which schoolmistresses are more unanimous and more emphatic than on the difficulty of knowing what to do with girls after leaving school. People who have not been brought into intimate converse with young women have little idea of the extent to which they suffer from perplexities of conscience. 'The discontent of the modern girl' is not mere idle self-torture. Busy men and women--and people with disciplined minds--can only, by a certain strain of the imagination, conceive the situation. If they at all entered into it, they could not have the heart to talk as they do. For the case of the modern girl is peculiarly hard in this, that she has fallen upon an age in which idleness is accounted disgraceful. The social atmosphere rings with exhortations to act, act in the living present. Everywhere we hear that true happiness is to be found in work--that there can be no leisure without toil--that people who do nothing are unfruitful fig-trees which cumber the ground. And in this atmosphere the modern girl lives and breathes. She is not a stone, and she does not live underground. She hears people talk--she listens to sermons--she reads books. And in her reading she comes across such passages as the following:--

Or again:--

'N'est-il pas vrai que la fadeur de la vie est ? la fois le grand malheur et le grand danger? Il y a une douzaine d'ann?es, un orateur s'?criait ? la tribune: "La France s'ennuie." Et moi je dis: L'humanit? s'ennuie, et son ennui ne date ni d'aujourd'hui ni d'hier, quoique peut-?tre il n'ait jamais ?t? plus visible qu'en ce moment. Sans la poursuite d'un but id?al, toute vie devient inevitablement insipide, m?me jusqu'au d?gout. Or, comptez parmi vos connaissances les personnes qui poursuivent un but ?lev?. Beaucoup vivent sans savoir pourquoi, uniquement, je pense, parce que chaque matin ram?ne le soleil. Que de femmes, si vous exceptez les m?res qui se donnent ? leur famille, que de femmes, h?las, dont la vie se passe enti?re dans de futiles occupations, ou dans des conversations plus futiles encore! Et l'on s'?tonne que, rong?es d'ennui, elles recherchent avec fr?n?sie toutes les distractions imaginables! Elles accusent la monotonie de leur existence d'?tre la cause de ce vague malaise; la vraie cause est ailleurs, elle est dans la fadeur intol?rable, non d'une vie d?pourvue d'?v?nements et d'aventures, mais d'une vie dont on n'entrevoit pas la raison ni le but. On se sent vivre sans qu'on y soit pour quelque chose, et cette vie inconsciente, inutile, absurde, inspire un m?contentement trop fond?.'

Such things the modern girl reads, and every word is confirmed by her own experience. With the practical English mind, which she has inherited from her father, she applies it all to herself. She seeks for counsel, and she finds it. She is bidden to 'look around her'--to do the duty that lies nearest--to teach in the schools, or visit the poor--to take up a pursuit--to lay down a course of study and stick to it. She looks around her, and sees no particular call to active exertion. The duties that lie in the way are swallowed up by an energetic mother or elder sister; very possibly she has no vocation for philanthropy--and the most devoted philanthropists are the most urgent in warning off people who lack the vocation--or she lives in a village where the children are better taught than she could teach them, and the poor are already too much visited by the clergyman's family; she feels no sort of impulse to take up any particular pursuit, or to follow out a course of study; and so long as she is quiet and amiable, and does not get out of health, nobody wants her to do anything. Her relations and friends--her world--are quite satisfied that she should 'hang about upon life, merely following her own'--or their own--'caprices and fancies.' The advice given, so easy to offer, so hard to follow, presupposes exactly what is wanting, a formed and disciplined character, able to stand alone, and to follow steadily a predetermined course, without fear of punishment, or hope of reward. Ought we to wonder if, in the great majority of cases, girls let themselves go drifting down the stream, despising themselves, but listlessly yielding to what seems to be their fate?

An appeal to natural guides is most often either summarily dismissed, or received with reproachful astonishment. It is considered a just cause for surprise and disappointment, that well brought up girls, surrounded with all the comforts of home, should have a wish or a thought extending beyond its precincts. And, perhaps, it is only natural that parents should be slow to encourage their daughters in aspirations after any duties and interests besides those of ministering to their comfort and pleasure. In taking for granted that this is the only object, other than that of marriage, for which women were created, they are but adopting the received sentiment of society. No doubt, too, they honestly believe that, in keeping their daughters to themselves till they marry, they are doing the best thing for them, as well as pleasing themselves. If the daughters take a different view, parents think it is because they are young and inexperienced, and incompetent to judge. The fact is, it is the parents who are inexperienced. Their youth was different in a hundred ways from the youth of this generation; and the experience of thirty years ago is far from being infallible in dealing with the difficulties and perplexities of the present. No doubt young people are ignorant, and want guidance. But they should be helped and advised, not silenced. Parents take upon themselves a heavy responsibility when they hastily crush the longing after a larger and more purposeful life.

That such an impulse is worthy of respect can scarcely be denied. The existence of capacities is in itself an indication that they are intended for some good purpose. Conscious power is not a burden, to be borne with patience, but a gift, for the due use of which the possessor rightly feels accountable. To have a soul which can be satisfied with vanities is not eminently virtuous and Christian, but the reverse. To be awake to responsibilities, sensitive in conscience, quickly responsive to all kindling influences, is a sign that education has, so far, done a good work. A flowing river is no doubt more troublesome to manage than a tranquil pool; but pools, if let alone too long, are apt to become noxious, as well as useless. The current may require to be wisely directed; but that there should be a current of being, wanting to set itself somewhere, is surely a cause for thankful rejoicing. It is an unfortunate misunderstanding of the true state of the case that makes parents sigh over what might well be their happiness and pride: one more exemplification of the sluggishness which hates nothing so bitterly as to be called upon to think--to consider a new idea--perhaps to go farther, and take a step out of the beaten track. It is much easier, no doubt, to say to a daughter who comes to you with her original notions--'My dear child, put it out of your head directly; it cannot be thought of for a moment'--than it would be to hear her patiently, to consider how far her crude ideas are practicable, to help her, so far as may be, in carrying them out. And one ought not to wonder that the easiest course is the one most commonly chosen. How far it may, or may not, be the duty of daughters to sacrifice their own wishes to the temporary pleasure of those to whom they owe so much, is a separate question. It is at least well for parents to know that, far more than they are at all aware of, it is felt to be a sacrifice, and that they must accept it as such, if at all.

The representation here given is, of course, not universally applicable. It is quite possible that in some senses, and to some persons, an apparently empty life may be easier, and even richer, than one of toil. There are people to whom the Happy Valley kind of life is by no means intolerable; and even earnest-minded and conscientious girls, urged by a strong sense of the heinousness of discontent, often manage to crush troublesome aspirations, and make themselves happy. There is something undignified in being miserable, without a just and intelligible cause to show for it; and many young women, capable of higher things, accommodate themselves with a considerable degree of cheerfulness to a narrow and unsatisfying round of existence. Nor is it intended to represent ladies as habitually doing nothing. On the contrary, they have many resources. Among them are various arts and handicrafts, gardening, letter-writing, and much reading. Of these, the last is perhaps the most popular and the most delusive. A girl who is 'very fond of reading' is considered to be happily suited with never-failing occupation, and no thought is taken as to what is to come of her reading. On this subject, the observations of Miss Aikin, herself an experienced reader, are worth considering. 'Continual reading,' she says, 'if desultory, and without a definite object, favours indolence, unsettles opinions, and of course enfeebles the mental and moral energies.' And Mr Robertson of Brighton, speaking in reference to girls, remarks that they 'read too much, and think too little. I will answer for it that there are few girls of eighteen who have not read more books than I have.... That multifarious reading weakens the mind more than doing nothing; for it becomes a necessity at last, like smoking, and is an excuse for the mind to lie dormant, whilst thought is poured in, and runs through, a clear stream, over unproductive gravel, on which not even mosses grow. It is the idlest of all idlenesses, and leaves more of impotency than any other.'

'More free From outward hindrance or impediment. For presently this hindrance thou shalt find That without which all goodness were a task So slight, that virtue never could grow strong.'

In reply to such admonitions they are tempted to inquire what task, other than that of dreaming, is set before them--what virtue, always excepting that one virtue of passive submission, has any chance of growing strong under such conditions. The 'slow,' who sink into dull inertia, and the 'fast,' who get rid of their superfluous energy in silly extravagances, have alike the excuse, that at the moment when they need the support of a routine explained and justified by a reasonable purpose, discipline and stimulus are at once withdrawn, leaving in their place no external support beyond the trivial demands and restraints of conventional society.

It may seem that an exaggerated importance is here attached to the interval between school and marriage; and if the considerations brought forward had reference to this period only, the charge would be just. But rightly to estimate the value of these years, we must bear in mind that they are the spring-time of life--the season of blossom, on which the fruit of the future depends. It is then that an impress is given to character which lasts through life. Opportunities then thrown away or misused can scarcely be recovered in later years. And it has seemed necessary to dwell upon the existing tenour of young women's lives, because, in dealing with the question of extending the duration of female education, we must be largely influenced by our conception of the alternative involved in leaving things as they are. It has been said that the end of education is 'to form a nation of living, orderly men.' If it has been shown that the course now pursued tends to make a large part of the nation inanimate and disorderly, a case would seem to be established for urging efforts at improvement.

FOOTNOTES:

As this pursuit is sometimes recommended with apparent seriousness, it may be as well to point out to the uninitiated, that if mistresses are to do the cooking, masters must dine alone. Dinners cannot be cooked an hour beforehand, and left to serve themselves up. In this, as in other arts, the finishing touches are among the most important. This does not mean, of course, that a mistress may not give directions and occasional help, or that it may not be a very good thing for girls to lend a hand, now and then, by way of learning to cook. That is a different thing from regularly spending a considerable part of their daily lives in the kitchen.

Letter to Dr Greenhill, an old pupil, in 'Life of Dr Arnold,' p. 392.

May not something like a counterpart of this mute, ceaseless conflict be hidden under many a monotonous and peaceful English life?

THINGS AS THEY MIGHT BE.

Supposing so much to be granted, it will be asked, What can be done? Clearly, girls cannot be kept at school indefinitely till they marry. When they leave school, say at eighteen, what are they to do next? The answer must chiefly depend on circumstances. Where the resources of the parents are such that there is a reasonable certainty of an abundant provision for the future, an education corresponding with that given by the universities to young men--in other words, 'the education of a lady,' considered irrespectively of any specific uses to which it may afterwards be turned--would appear to be the desideratum. And clearly 'the education of a lady' ought to mean the highest and the finest culture of the time. The accurate habits of thought and the intellectual polish by which the scholar is distinguished, ought to be no less carefully sought in the training of women than in that of men. This would be true, even if only for the sake of the charm which high culture gives to social intercourse, a charm attainable in no other way. But apart from this consideration, the duties of women of the higher class are such as to demand varied knowledge as well as a disciplined mind and character. Difficult cases in social ethics frequently arise, on which women are obliged to act and to guide the action of others. However incompetent they may be, they cannot escape the responsibility of judging and deciding. And though natural sagacity and the happy impulses of which we hear so much often come to their aid, prejudice and mistaken impulses ought also to be taken into the account as disturbing elements of a very misleading kind. In dealing with social difficulties, the value of a cultivated judgment, able to unravel entangled evidence, and to give due weight to a great variety of conflicting considerations, would seem to be obvious enough. It would be well worth while to exchange the wonderful unconscious instinct, by which women are supposed to leap to right conclusions, no one knows how, for the conscious power of looking steadily and comprehensively at the whole facts of a case, and thereupon shaping a course of action, with a clear conception of its probable issues. Of course, a merely literary education will not give this power. Knowledge of the world and of human nature, only to be gained by observation and experience, go farther than mere knowledge of books. But the habit of impartiality and deliberation--of surveying a wide field of thought--and of penetrating, so far as human eye can see, into the heart of things--which is promoted by genuine study even of books alone--tends to produce an attitude of mind favourable for the consideration of complicated questions of any sort. A comparison between the judgment of a scholar and that of an uneducated man on matters requiring delicate discrimination and grasp of thought, shows the degree in which the intellect may be fitted by training for tasks of this nature. A large and liberal culture is probably also the best corrective of the tendency to take petty views of things, and on this account is especially to be desired for women on whom it devolves to give the tone to 'society.'

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