WOMEN IN THE ALLIANCE. 3 1 I 



poverty and want. The faces and forms of many of the farmers' wives 

 bear marks of premature age. Their sensibilities are deadened with the 

 cares and toils of life. They have enjoyed but few of the benefits of 

 modern civilization, and but few of the luxuries of life which they have 

 helped to create. They have plodded along, while conscienceless greed 

 has fattened upon their labor, and deprived them of the conditions 

 which are necessary to make them happy and good, their lives a 

 blessing, their homes a heaven. 



But this is a new era in human progress, when woman demands- an 

 equal opportunity in every department of life. She is no longer to be 

 considered a tool, a mere plaything, but a human being, with a soul to 

 save and a body to protect. Her mind must be cultivated, that she 

 may be made more useful in the reform movement and the develop- 

 ment of the race. It is an acknowledged principle in science that 

 cultivated and intelligent mothers produce brainy children, and the only, 

 means by which the minds of the human race can be developed is to 

 strengthen, by cultivation, the intellectual capacities of the mothers, by 

 which means a mentally great race may be produced. When I look into 

 the hard and stolid faces of many of the mothers of the present, and 

 know that they have been deprived of the opportunities which would have 

 improved them, I am not surprised that we are surrounded by people 

 who are the advocates of a system but little better than cannibalism. 



Through a system of education, in the Alliance and kindred organi- 

 zations, we are slowly but surely eradicating the false doctrines of the 

 Dark Ages, and the traditions of the pagans, handed down to us through 

 false teaching. To remove these evils is the grandest work of the age, 

 and the woman who holds herself aloof from reform organizations, either 

 through false pride or a lack of moral courage, is an object of pity, and 

 falls far short of the duty she owes to herself, society, and posterity. 



If I understand the object of the Alliance, it is organized not only to 

 better the financial condition of the people, but to elevate them socially, 

 and in every other way, and make them happier and better, and to make 

 this world a fit habitation for man, by giving to the people equal oppor- 

 tunities. Every woman who has at heart the welfare of the race should 

 attach herself to some reform organization, and lend her help toward the 

 removal of the causes which have filled the world with crime and sorrow, 

 and made outcasts of so many of her sex. It is a work in which all may 

 engage, with the assurance that they are entering upon a labor of love, 

 in the interest of the downtrodden and disinherited ; a work by which 

 all mankind will be blessed, and which will bless those who are to come 

 after for all time. 



