EDUCATION AND THE HEALTH OF WOMEN. 827 



It is the natural tendency for those powers which are constitution- 

 ally the strongest to overrule and weaken the others. If woman is, 

 from physiological causes, more emotional than is good for her, and the 

 habits of civilized life have increased this tendency, if emotional ex- 

 citement weakens the control which the will ought to exercise over the 

 powers of attention and reflection that stand at the head of intellec- 

 tion, it is the first business of the teacher to employ a girl's faculties as 

 equally as possible to restrain those which unduly predominate, and 

 exercise the weaker powers. 



A girl should be made to understand, from the first, that the edu- 

 cation she receives at school is to do for her mind what the scales and 

 exercises do for her fingers in her musical studies ; that she is not to 

 study simply to acquire facts, but to get control of her mind. More- 

 over, she should be taught that it is her duty to look forward to a life- 

 long intellectual activity, so that, when she comes to take full charge 

 of herself, she will direct her mature powei's toward some pursuit or 

 line of study which will promote her present or future welfare, and 

 insure to her wholesome mental habits. Especially should her will- 

 power, the force which will, more than any other, make or mar her, 

 receive the most careful training ; so that, become adult, she will be 

 able to use it physiologically, and determinately turn from the enemies, 

 wounds, and serious sorrows, that otherwise might induce nervous dis- 

 ease, or drive her into a mad-house, to some one of the many subjects 

 of interest in which the world abounds. 



The first mistake in the education of girls, and the one fraught with 

 the saddest results, is made when they are allowed to leave childhood 

 too soon. To keep them little girls as long as possible, and make them, 

 first of all, what George MacDonald calls "blessed little animals," is 

 the first step in the right direction. 



The second mistake is, permitting growing girls to sit in the house 

 and study when their ti'ansparent cheeks tell of anaemia and lowered 

 vitality. So long as there are branches of knowledge which are ad- 

 mirable training for the mind and can be pursued best out of doors, 

 this mistake is inexcusable. It remains to be seen whether the old 

 methods of education in use in boys' schools are the best for girls : 

 they are best only if they are most physiological. Girls should be 

 treated as they are, not as they might be under improved habits and 

 conditions. 



The third mistake is, making the school-life of girls final, when it 

 ought to be a simple preparation for the intellectual life of the adult 

 woman. 



A fourth mistake is, withholding a knowledge of the laws to which 

 woman is subject, in her physical and her mental life, her place in na- 

 ture, and the potential character of her mental states and habits. 



