THE GOLDEN GARDENEB 105 



contemporary of the cave-bear. True humanity does 

 not yet exist ; it is growing, little by little, created 

 by the ferment of the centuries and the dictates of con- 

 science ; but it progresses towards the highest with 

 heartbreaking slowness. 



It was only yesterday that slavery finally disappeared : 

 the basis of the ancient social organism ; only yester- 

 day was it realised that man, even though black, is 

 really man and deserves to be treated accordingly. 



What formerly was woman? She was what she is 

 to-day in the East : a gentle animal without a soul. 

 The question was long discussed by the learned. The 

 great divine of the seventeenth century, Bossuet 

 himself, regarded woman as the ditninutive of man. 

 The proof was in the origin of Eve : she was the 

 superfluous bone, the thirteenth rib which Adam 

 possessed in the beginning. It has at last been 

 admitted that woman possesses a soul like our own, 

 but even superior in tenderness and devotion. She 

 has been allowed to educate herself, which she has 

 done at least as zealously as her coadjutor. But the 

 law, that gloomy cavern which is still the lurking- 

 place of so many barbarities, continues to regard her 

 as an incapable and a minor. The law in turn will 

 finally surrender to the truth. 



The abolition of slavery and the education of woman : 

 these are two enormous strides upon the path of 

 moral progress. Our descendants will go farther. 

 They will see, with a lucidity capable of piercing 

 every obstacle, that war is the most hopeless of aU 

 absurdities. That our conquerors, victors of battles 

 and destroyers of nations, are detestable scourges ; 



