FARMERS' INSTITUTES. 141 



aud if possible to so awaken your interest that other similar clubs may 

 be organized. 



And I hope to prove also that my inconsistency is in part at least only 

 apparent, not real, and that in the Lapeer County Club is realized to some 

 degree my ideal of a society for the cultivation of graceful leisure. 



It is trite to say that civilization is organization, quite as trite to say 

 that this is an age of organization, and perhaps most trite of all to call 

 this the "woman's age." It is every one else's age too, the inventor's, the 

 explorer's, the missionary's, the w^orkingman's; we women are perhaps 

 apt to overlook that. But that this is 



AN AGE CONSPICUOUS FOR WOMEN'S ORGANIZATIONS 



may be trite, but it is also true, a virtue which every trite remark does not 

 possess. 



And whatever may be the abuses of organization, and they are many, 

 the root of the matter lies in this, that we have learned to believe with 

 Edward Everett Hale that "apart" is the saddest word in the English 

 language, and "together" one of the most blessed. 



So when women organize for mutual aid in individual development, if 

 they are in earnest, they must of necessity cultivate certain virtues from 

 the very nature of their work together. A good club woman must be un- 

 selfish, reliable, and prompt. Planning for the good of the club she 

 learns the value of self-renunciation; she learns what Plato meant when 

 he said "the soul of philosophy is love," she learns that the dev(^lo})ment 

 of the individual is so far the development of the race. The shy woman 

 who offers her quota to the entertainment of the club when asked to do 

 so, and the efficient woman who urges her timid associate to do the work 

 required though her fingers are tingling with desire to do it herself, each 

 work out the same problem by a different method, and both learn a valu- 

 able lesson which could on4y come to them from association with each 

 other in some organized work. 



It may be said that women learn self-renunciation in their own home 

 and home life, and this is true, but after all is not the unselfishness we 

 give to our own. because we love to, simply a higher form of selfishness? 

 Does it really form the altruistic and broadening virtue of self renuncia- 

 tion for a cause and a community? 



Then another virtue learned in club work is the 



DOING AWAY WITH CLASS DISTINCTIONS 



and social and sectarian prejudices. I know of no other place where a 

 woman stands so entirely on her own merits. She may have wealth, 

 beauty and social position, and if she have brains all these things will 

 add to her prestige in the club, but if she have not brains they count for 

 nothing. And the woman who has brains may haye none of these, she 

 may even offend some of our dearest prejudices, she may not belong to 

 our church, we may not meet her socially except at the club, but let her 

 prove herself a woman who thinks, and our lives are just so much the 

 richer, not only by what she teaches us. but by the interest in, and respect 

 for herself which she has awakened in us, and this would in all prob- 

 ability come to pass in no other way than in club work. 



