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vice to the state. Let him lift up his testimony against 'public exhibitions in the Sorbonne,' against receiving prizes in the Salles publiques des Mairies, at Comices Agricoles, Expositions,' and the like, against reciting odes before a large mixed audience, which are all most dangerous for young girls, and specially for French girls it is evident. These however are by no means inventions due to M. Duruy and his assistants. They exist already in many French girl-schools and in the crowning of the Rosière.

Many of the subjects of lectures cited by the Bishop are certainly not very judicious; but does he think the erotic literature of the convent more likely to produce modest women? As he says, many of the professors may have gone far in scientific rationalism, but a study of the surprising facts of the Catechism is hardly likely to fortify the mind against its attacks. He complains of the books placed in the libraries of the lycées, and mentions amongst them with horror Don Quixote, our joyfullest and all but our deepest modern book,' observes Carlyle; and the Jerusalem Delivered, great Christian epic,' as it is generally considered. He says these will stain 'la foi et la délicatesse des mœurs.' Does he really, after the wise counsel given in his first volume, consider the abominable lives of saints to be more edifying?

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And so we return once more to the original idea of the opposition between faith and knowledge, the belief that ignorance and innocence are synonymous, the virtues of darkness, the devotion to Plato's 'shadows of the cave,' the honest terror that light of all kinds must be dangerous for the eyes, the source of the myths, older than Faust (the old German story, not Goethe's) or even Prometheus, that the gods will punish the desire of knowledge, which is not good for man, still less for woman.

It is supposed that a young girl is more likely to be religious for

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believing that Pilate died at Vienna, and that birds were born of the sea; more modest, for never even seeing a man, even a gardener.' 'Is man more wise than his Creator?' as Job inquired, no one can tell how many hundred years ago. Has He separated men from women in families in the world? Male and female created He them. And these attempts to improve God's arrange ments by concocting such an utterly artificial, unnatural life, bears its own fruit of evil, and tends to a fearful reaction, as the Bishop himself bears witness. At the first contact with the real world, the bewildered girl, seeing man almost for the first time, as a natural result, feels a morbid interest in these charming fiends, so seductive, so terrible that they were not even to be looked at.

As to the experience we may gain by studying these different experiments in education, we shall probably feel that one extreme is almost as bad as the other; the unbelieving professors and the superstitious nuns are both of them very little to our taste. The reaction from the igno rant and narrow restrictions on female teaching in France has led to a desire that girls should study exactly the same things as men; and if Messrs. Albert & Co. give them lectures on Abélard and Rabelais, upon Rousseau and Voltaire, as M. Dupanloup declares, we shall certainly agree with him, that how ever useful in a study of French literature for grown-up intelligences, these are utterly unfitted for young girls.

We do not wish the Home Secretary to request the masters of Eton and Harrow, and all the grammar schools,' to undertake the education of English girls, and we shall certainly not confide our daughters to the petty jealousies, the narrow intellects and hearts, of the conven tual Mrs. Stars and Miss Saurins. Still, if we return to the advice of the Bishop before he lost his temper

and the balance of his judgment, we shall find his observations as applicable in our own case as in France. To enable a girl to learn something which she cares for so thoroughly as to make it a real interest in her after life, to allow her a greater choice of subjects-indeed, to choose that for which she has a 'vocation,' to use a grand word to discourage that foolish smattering of knowledge, that series of indifferently taught accomplishments whichevery girl is forced to pass through, and which nine tenths of them drop entirely when they are married; in short, to be accurate and conscientious, and not to be allowed to skate over the surface of history and languages as they now too often do, is what we should aim at. A girl who conceives that she understands French, Italian, and German will often be found to misuse half the genders in her French talk, not to be able to translate an ordinary Italian letter, and when you ask her the meaning of the page or German which she is reading off so glibly, prove that she does not understand half the principal words, which yet she does not take the trouble to look out, but goes on snatching at the sense as if such trifles did not signify; while, not improbably, you may find the young lady undertaking the study of some dead language in the same fashion.

There is no examination, no comparison with other minds possible in the ordinary governess education in England; and only those who have occasion to test it can conceive the extraordinary incorrectness of the information, the shallowness of the knowledge of the common 'well educated' girl, the want of any power of reasoning, of any knowledge of the logical sequences of cause and effect in her mind.

Women have hitherto never been made to feel that there is any importance in the accuracy of what they learn; they have never been

compelled to bring up their knowledge, as it were, to a pitched battle, to find out which were trusty battalions of facts to be relied on, and which would give way under the least pressure. They have never realised what it is to know that a class or a fellowship, an appointment for India or a clerkship in a public office-i.e. the whole future of their lives-depended upon the correctness of their construing of a Greek play, their facts concerning Charlemagne or Charles V., their differential calculus or their algebra; and wanting these material incentives, they and their parents have been perfectly satisfied with the slovenly results incident to such dilettante teaching as they have hitherto been only able to obtain.

Knowledge will not give women more influence, as sometimes seems to be feared; indeed, it is hardly possible to be greater than it is, and certainly not desirable; but it will enable them to use wisely, for wise ends, that which they possess in such large measure already. Indeed, if men at all realised the amount which they exercise at present in life, they would take care that they were better fitted to wield it. Fénelon, certainly no advanced Liberal, says, 'there is no doubt that the bad education of women does more harm than that of men.' It is often at present the least estimable part of a woman which gives her this sway over man.

If we attempt to calculate the power of a mother over her children in their early days, both with regard to their health and characters, the power, both for good and for evil, of young women over young men, that of mothers over their sons, of wives over their husbands, and make some sort of estimate of its aggregate, we shall not any longer consent to leave the preparation for such a sphere of action in the hands of the worst educated of human beings-i.e. the larger portion of

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A clever, educated woman may be reasoned with and convinced; it is the ignorant, narrow, obstinate woman, secing only one side of a question, believing that there can be no right but her own, who, adhering doggedly to her own way, so often carries the day against her busy husband, who has no time and no inclination to battle out the infinitesimal trifles, which yet make up so large a part of life. It is the inferior mind which generally rules the household. A man or woman with many interests in life and sympathy with many ideas does not care to contest indifferent matters; and to be always on the watch to obtain that large field of influence which falls in by lapse' gives an incalculable advantage in the long

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women; this is an evil which at present would seem very little to be dreaded. Although the love of reading is quite as common among girls as among boys, the over devotion to it amid the engrossing cares of after life is not likely to be exceedingly dangerous.

It is the power of assimilation which is so wanting in ordinary minds, and which ought to be culti vated-to teach them that the random skimming of a dozen reviews, the whipt cream, as it were, of other folks' knowledge, is not equal to the painstaking digging out of the essence of one fact and making it their own. Robertson complains of the dreadful habit of swallowing books which is growing on this generation. I have,' he says, ' read fewer books than most girls of nineteen ;' but then he had made use of them.

To this should be added the acquiring the rare art of intelligent listening, so as to benefit oneself and assist the speaker; neither to disturb, divert, nor lower the conversation,' says Dupanloup, the first of the liberal arts,' as some one calls it; and this would appear to be essentially feminine. Yet there is generally no worse listener than a young girl, unless it be in affairs of sentiment, when a fellow feeling makes her wondrous kind.'

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There has been an extraordinary change in opinion on these questions

even during the last few months. Three of our universities have already given our girls the opportunity of testing their knowledge by examinations; lectures are being established in most of our great towns, on almost all conceivable subjects; and there has been a general sifting and overhauling of our girl schools and teachers. Whether in the efforts now making we have yet hit upon the best methods of communicating knowledge without injuring home character remains to be seen; but even if, as seems probable, a 'college for

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women' cannot generally be made to fit into the present arrangements of society, it will at least give an opening for girls to obtain (if they please) a year or so of honest work in any pursuit for which they have real talent, and which the extremely fragmentary nature of women's ordinary home life renders so difficult to arrange. Above all it will prepare teachers with some recognised standard of ability and acquirements such as we cannot now obtain. It will get rid of the broken-down lady who, knowing nothing herself, aspires to teach that nothing to our daughters-to whom we have been hitherto chiefly condemned.

Probably also by giving some sort of certificate like the diploma required for governesses in Germany and elsewhere, it will cause that ill used class to be both more considered and better paid, and so open the field to a higher order of ability.

It is evident that household cares can no longer find the same occupa tion for woman as of old. Before the time of machinery and of shops, the feeding and clothing, the comfort, even the existence of the whole establishment depended upon her; her wise forethought, her manual dexterity, and her power of management, provided for all, and this was a sufficiently interesting and difficult duty for her life, and a large opening for her energies. The 'virtuous woman' in Proverbs is no household drudge; she is a merchant, an agriculturist, and an admirable ruler; she 'maketh fine linen and selleth it,'' she considereth a field and buyeth it,' and 'with the fruit of her hands she planteth a vineyard; she has evidently a turn for art, and wears very fine clothes, silk and purple, but she is good to the poor, she openeth her mouth with wisdom,' she looks after her household and children, and causes her husband to be

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honoured,' 'strength and honour are her clothing,' and her 'rejoicing' is particularly mentioned. This woman certainly wanted neither occupation nor consideration. Her particular work is done, but it is her modern equivalent which we want now to produce.

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'The brain of woman,' said Professor Barlow some time since, in a lecture at the Royal Institution, though smaller absolutely than that of man, is larger relatively to the size of her body.' He fortifies himself with many quotations from professors both German and English for the fact, and proceeds to say that this large development of her intellectual organs requires culture,' and the danger of leaving them to run to seed is great. With these large brains, the rare susceptibility and quick perceptions which women generally possess, unless good and useful pursuits are open to them, and they have worthy objects to occupy their minds, they will take up with those which are mean and low, but which offer a chance of power, always peculiarly charming to an inferior. It is not by their noblest qualities that some of the least excellent of the sex have ruled so royally. A woman can flirt by nature, but she reaches her best development only as the result of very careful culture.

To put the question in its lowest form, women are half the human race, and merely as a matter of numbers it may be worth trying whether the world would not advance faster if a good education' were given them. There is amongst us the widest disparity of opinion as to what constitutes this 'good education,' but as no party believes that we possess it, or anything approaching to it, at the present moment, in the midst of our own uncertainties, any evidence as to the mistakes and experience of other nations becomes exceedingly valuable.

OF UNCONSCIOUSNESS AND ANNIHILATION.

WHEN

HEN I was a boy, I was a mutinous boy. I do not mean by this that by overt acts (as lawyers call them) I rebelled against my pastors and masters. I never took part in the barring out of a schoolmaster. The very worst I did was to wrap up a bee (a very large wild bee) in a small piece of very thin paper, and violently throw it from a distance at a near-sighted master's head. By the time the bee got within a few inches of the head, it had escaped from the imperfect wrapping up; and it proceeded angrily to buzz about the head, to the annoyance of the master and the delight of the scholars. And if the delight afforded to many scholars was incomparably greater in amount than the annoyance of the individual master, who shall say that what was done that day is philosophically to be condemned ? The individual must be sacrificed to the well-being of the community. This is fully recognised by English law; as you may discern in the matter of the carrying of railways through private

property.

To return to whence I set forth. I was intellectually mutinous. When I was taught to believe anything, I rose against it. When I was informed that anything was very good, I could not help thinking it was very bad. Thus for a large portion of my life, having had it dunned into me that Shakespeare was a great writer, I thought him a great humbug. His jokes were often vile. His long speeches were sickeningly tiresome. Of course, I have come now to estimate that individual differently; though I have not yet come to wish, with Mr. Thackeray, that I had been Shakespeare's shoeblack. Being taken to London, and required to think that the Mayfair district was

beautiful, I incurred severe punishment by declaring it was very ugly. The latter view I still hold. Looking back, in fact, I have no doubt I was a conceited and opinionated fool. I have no doubt the reader was a fool too: if he were not a mere piece of soft clay, receptive of whatever was impressed on him.

There was a piece of poetry, or at least of verse, which I was constrained in those days to commit to memory, and publicly repeat, with appropriate gesticulation, before a large assemblage. It was Cato's soliloquy about the immortality of the soul. School books are much changed: I think this old favourite piece has now disappeared from them. I inwardly rebelled against that piece, even as I repeated it. In that piece, the accomplished author makes Cato speak of human nature as shrinking from annihilation:

Whence this pleasing hope, this fond desire, This longing after immortality?

Or whence this secret dread, and inward horror

of falling into nought?

I quote no more: that is the idea, and then it is beaten out thin.

This is accepted by many without due thought. Is there in human nature this shrinking from annihilation? tion? I doubted it as a little boy. I doubt it much more now. There are some certain facts which look another way.

What is the most prevalent vice of humanity? It is the use of intoxicating liquors or drugs. Find human beings where you may, savage and civilised, they have found out something that can intoxicate; and a great many habitually use that to excess. And what is the great end of all intoxicating liquors or drugs? Why, it is unconsciousness. It is to get away

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