THE HIGHER EDUCATION OF WOMAN. 177 



ever, we have received so many grand and noble impulses — this female 

 individualism, with its corresponding indifference to the public good 

 or to public duty, is even more pronounced than here ; and the right 

 of woman to her own development, though that should include what 

 is called " the painless extinction of man," is the very heart and soul 

 of the new creed. 



"Women, seeking to rule, have forgotten how to obey. Wishing to 

 reorganize society according to their own desires, they have at the 

 same time thrown off all sense of discipline in their own lives ; and 

 the former feminine virtues of devotion, patience, self-suppression, and 

 obedience are flung aside as so much tarnished finery of a decayed and 

 dishonored idol. The ordinary woman can not be got to see that she 

 is not only herself but also a member of society and part of an organi- 

 zation ; and that she owes, as a duty to the community, the subordina- 

 tion of her individualism to that organization. She understands this 

 only in religious communities, where she obeys her director as one 

 divinely commissioned. Outside religious discipline she refuses obe- 

 dience to general principles. Society has grown so large and its dis- 

 organization is so complete that, she says to herself, her own example 

 does not count. She is but a fractional part of a grain added to a ton- 

 weight ; and by the law of psycho-dynamics she is undiscerned and 

 without influence. It is all very well in small communities, like those 

 of Greece for instance, or when the one grand lady of the village was 

 the mirror for all to dress by. Then, the individual example was of 

 value ; but now — who cares for one out of the tens of thousands 

 crowded in London ; and what duty has she to the community com- 

 parable to that which she owes herself ? 



And this brings us round once more to the subject-matter of this 

 paper — the effect on the community of the higher education of women, 

 in its good and evil results on mothers and their offspring, and their 

 own indifference to these results. 



It is impossible not to sympathize with a bright girl anxious to go 

 on with her education, and petitioning for leave to study higher mat- 

 ters than have been taught her at her school. It is as impossible not to 

 feel a sense of indignation at the injustice when parents say frankly 

 the education of their girls does not count with them ; and, so long as 

 these know how to read and write and can play the piano and are able 

 to dance and perhaps to sew, there is nothing more necessary. We 

 do battle then for the right of the individual to know, to learn, to per- 

 fect itself to the utmost of its ability, irrespective of sex. But if we 

 are wise we stop short of such strain as would hurt the health and 

 damage the reproductive energies, if marriage is to come into one of 

 the chances of the future. A girl is something more than an individual ; 

 she is the potential mother of a race ; and the last is greater and more 

 important than the first. Let her learn by all means. Let her store 

 her mind and add to her knowledge, but always with quietness and 

 vol. xxx. — 12 



