Manhood and Womanhood, Part II [pp. 343-344]

1869.] LITLRA TUBE SCIENCL AND ABR 343
In illustration of the fact that the more you know of Rome
the more you feel your ignorance of it, did you ever hear what
Gregory XVI. was accustomed to say to strangers visiting him
ceremoniously at his pontifical reception, as they passed by his
throne: "How long have you been in Rome?" "A week,
your holiness." "And when do you leave?" "A week
hence, your holiness.'" "Well, you will have seen Rome."
The next visitor,' to the same inquiries of the pope, replies,
"Three weeks," and that he stays three more. The pope says,
"You will know Rome very well by that time." The third, to
the same questions of his holiness, answers that he has been in
Rome three months, and proposes to stay three more. "Ah!
you will have had quite a taste of Rome in a whole winter,"
replies the pope: But to the last, who has been there a year,
and is comingor another, the pope says, " A very good beginning."
You saw Michael Angelo's "Moses," you say. Were you
not afraid he would'et up and knock you over? Not much
of the meek lawgiver about -hil I' He looks as if he had just
eaten half an ox, and had not yet wiped his chops. I shouldn't
like to be his provider! T fDid. you notice ow out of drawing
the articulation of the, lower jaw is? He could not for his
life open his mouth; the jaw would wobble like a pendulum.
End where is the place for his statesmanlike brains? Certainly
not in the top of his head. Nothing can overstate Michael Angelo's greatness; but, if he had.condescended to measurements,
he would have escaped many very injurious niistakeN.) His
"hrist with the Cross," in the Church of, in ome,
is, after all, only a young buck. Even the ancients were not in fallible. Look at the back of the Venus; you will see that the
dimple marking the articulation over the sacrum, which belongs
to the limb that is dropped, is higher than the mark of the
other joint, when it should have been half an inch lower. The
error is demonstrable.
MANHOOD AND WOMANHOOD.
BY DR. THOMAS LAYcoCE, PROFESSOR OF MEDICAL PSYCEOL OGY IN THE UNIVERSITY OF EDINBURGH.
II.
rTHE duties of woman, being those of the family, would be easy
under natural conditions, were there no disturbing causes
at work, for the number of males born exceeds that of females.
an(d thus the source of human society, the married pair, would
be always complete. But the duties of the vir, by exposing
him to greater dangers, diminish his numbers in barbarous
tribes, while in civilized communities the withdrawal of the
young, active, and marriageable, into warlike, commercial, and
colonizing enterprises, interferes with that pairing which forms
the family. For these reasons many women find no mates, and
.never can. The compensation of this disturbance of the fun damental law is manifested in the lower evolution of human
society as polygamy, in which several women, as wives or con cubines, are made subservient to the sensual pleasures and the
uses of one man; and, in the higher evolution, as polygyny, in
which several women constitute the household as helps and
companions to the married pair at the head.
In the stage of civilization characterized by great cities-in
Europe at least-the household unit wholly fails to provide for
women, so that many are left to provide for themselves and
their children. In England, in 1861, 840,000 married women,
or about one-fourth of the whole number, were thus occupied,
and two-thirds of the widows, or 490,000. In every age and
in every race, under similar conditions, the same social results
of civilization follow. Woman is thus driven to compete for
the means of subsistence with the vir under circumstances
which inevitably place her at a disadvantage in all the spheres
of social enterprise, except the one in which competition is
rather with each other for man, and certainly not possible with
him.
With a view to the redress of woman's grievances, various
means have been recommended. The higher education ofrwoman has been chiefly advocated in this country, partly with a
view to fit her for the better performance of the duties of wife
and mother, and so diminish that disinclination to marry which
in a luxurious state of civilization men manifest, and partly
with a view to bread-winning. Whatever enlightens the understanding of a woman, and teaches her that the domestic virtues and acquirements are her best recommendation, and the
true sources of her power, must advance her position. It is
not too much to say that to a woman the knowledge of the
things that lie before her in daily life is her prime wisdom, and
the most solid basis for her welfare and the welfare of society,
which are in truth identical. Healthy mothers of healthy children lie at the root of all national greatness, of whatever kind.
Hence a knowledge of all that concerns health in the household should constitute an essential part of every 4oman's education.
The principles and practice of hygiene should take precedence
of the principles and practice of medicine, and the art of nursing of the art of curing. Woman's education with a view to
bread-winning raises much wider questions. Capability to do is
by no means the chief; fitness and political expediency are of at
least equal importance. It may be fully admitted that there is
hardly any masculine pursuit in civilized life for which masculine women might not be found-women able and willing to
command the Channel fleet, cut for the stone, or serve in the
artillery; but it would hardly be maintained that such and similar duties would be either morally fit for the woman or politically expedient.
It is very certain, too, that not a few occupations
now followed by men would be more fittingly, if not more
successfully, followed by women. But, granted that women
are not only fit and able, but have succeeded in securing employment in every sphere in which they desire to work, just as
women are employed men in the same proportion will be displaced, will emigrate, and otherwise disappear; women would
then compete with each other for employment, and still more
actively for the men, so that all the conditions of the problem
would remain unsolved. The chief results would be a further
diminution in the virile force of the nation, and an increase in
prostitution, infanticide, and that meretricious competition for
marriage-connections which inevitably results from an excess in
the number of women.
It follows, therefore, that the radical remedy for the evils
of modern civilization is a better distribution of the sexes. In
the newly-populated colonies of the Anglo-Saxon race, women
are needed, fitted for the duties of helpmates to the colonists.
In California, there are three males to one female; in Nevada,
eight to one; in Colorado, twenty to one. The noxious and
unnatural differences in the proportions of the sexes in city and
colony are unquestionably due in part to the disinclination of
women to emigrate, but in part, too, to their unfitness. to help
man in the fulfilment of his primal duty and destiny, which is
to "multiply and replenish the earth, and SUBDUE it." Nothing
but a suitable education of woman in the mass to this end can
meet this unfitness. There seems to be less excuse for unwillingness to emigrate for the women of the United States than
for those of the Old World, with its conventionalities and its
distance from the region to be subdued. It is to the latter,
indeed, that the success of polygamy in Utah must be attributed.
Whatever man is, woman will reflect his nature; but then
she has the moulding of his nature and of his character in some
degree, at least, in her hands; and, strong in her maternal and
moral instincts, she will be able to do more for man's spiritual
and moral elevation, as an educated wife and mother, than in
any virile occupation whatever, however honorably she may fill
LITERA.TU-RE, SCIENCE, AN-D A-RT
1869.]
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