Education of Southern Women [pp. 381-390]

EDUCATION OF SOUTHERN WOOMEN.
as man, is involved in the samne moral ruin, may participate
equally in a common salvation, and has the same eternal and
final destiny. If' the objector should ask, where are the actual
evidences of this equality; where the mathematicitans; the
poets, the artists of the gentler sex, it might, perhaps, be sufficient to say in reply, that in no age, and in no country have
women received intellectual training equal to man. And
fiurther, we might point with s)ride to the roll of illustrious
female names, and wonder that with advantages so limited
they were able to accomplish so much. But we do not go to
the length of maintaining an absolute equality in the sexes.
The relation which exists between them is rather that of equialentce than of equ(lity, that is to say, without balancing each
quality of the male intellect against the same one in the female,
yet in considering their intellects in the aggregate of all the
powers, womian's mind will be found the equivalent of m'f.
It is a hackneyed observation that man is superior in the prhely
intellectual, and woman in the emotional part of our nature.
This is in consequence of the broad line of demarcation which
has been drawn by metaphysicians between the intellet and
the sensibilities. By them the human mind is mapped out,
with its boundaries and subdivisions, as rigid and unchanging
as the natural barriers that separate countries. That this is
false philosophy is evident to all who, in closely watching the
operations of the mifid, have observed the wonderful connection and dependence upon each other of tho?ught and feeling.
The hl-uma-tn mind is, we believe, a unit, possessing powers and
capabilities in different directions, and all capable of an expansion and development almost unlimited. While, then, we would
not affirm that there are no original and congenital differencecs
between man and woman, we do believe that the actual difference in the intellectual status of man and woman is mainly due
to the different courses of training and develol)ment to which
customni has subjected the two sexes. Man, in the rough shock
and conflict of the outer world, requires more a development
of his purely intellectual powers; woman, in her gentle and
unobtrusive walk within the family circle, requires more the
development. of her moral powers. In both cases there is
development of the intellect, but in clhannels somewhat different, but we claim for woman the right to a higher developiment
of those powers of the intellect which are now somewhat
neglected.
There is, then, a great fault in the system of education for
women. W\here does this fault lie? WVhat is the origin of it?
Who is responsible for it? The fault lies in an incorrect estimrate of woman's powers, and in a false view of her relation to
man. We have already given our reasons for believing that
too low an estimate is placed upon her intellect. The effect of
this low estimate is seen in the low grade of scholarship de
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