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EDITORIAL NOTES.

THE Constantly broadening sphere of woman's influence THE ERA is to me the most hopeful and important sign of our times. OF The era of woman has dawned, bearing the unmistakable WOMAN. prophecy of a far higher civilization than humanity has ever known. It is an incontestable fact that woman is ethically, infinitely superior to man; her moral perceptions are firmer and stronger, her unselfishness far greater, her spiritual nature deeper and richer than that of her brothers. She is to-day foremost in the great social, philanthropic, humanitarian, and ethical reforms, in which selfishness has no place. In her widening influence, growing liberty, and freedom, I see impearled a prophecy of an altruistic era—a civilization triumphant rising against to-morrow's purpling dawn.

In the fields of intellectual and scientific research she has grandly won her way, and that despite the marshalled forces of conservatism, which have stubbornly contested every step that has looked towards a broader, more independent and purposeful life. For centuries relegated to the rear, compelled to take thought second-hand, denied a healthful freedom and the right of a liberal education, so highly prized by man, her marvellous attainments since she has in a measure broken the bonds of conservatism and trampled under foot the baleful heritage of ancient thought, have been so splendid in their reality and so pregnant with prophecies of future triumph, that I confidently expect to find in her the one invincible ally of the forces warring for a higher, purer, more just and humane condition of life. In her epoch-marking victories she has lost none of her old-time charms, the wonderful refinement of sentiment, the delicacy of thought, the rich soul life, the deep emotional nature, the strong moral character, pure as the glistening snow-clad peaks in the midst of the moral degradation which taints manhood. These have remained in their pristine beauty since she has emerged from her age-long retirement into a more influential sphere; in truth they have been strengthened and made more impressive by the fuller development of her nature.

It must not be supposed, however, that her struggles are over. Before she can or will attain an influence commensurate with her work, she must emancipate herself from the bondage of fashion, which as seriously reflects on her good judgment as it wrecks her health and menaces the life and happiness of her offsprings. She must also repudiate the age-hallowed insult dwelt upon in the old Edenic legend of the fall of man, which for centuries has been brandished in her face to teach her humility, and make her feel degraded in the presence of her "lords and masters." An

essentially barbarous conception, born of a cowardly and brutal childhood age, and as unworthy of our day and generation as is the hideous, old-time conception of God, in which He was pictured as an angry and jealous Being, counselling the wholesale slaughter of men and little children, and the prostitution of daughters, wives, and mothers, by hordes of brutal invaders, whom He chose to designate his peculiar people.

Again, womanhood must refuse to heed the admonitions of Paul, which have for almost two thousand years been thundered from the pulpit, and persistently preached from the fireside as though they were oracles from heaven, rather than the natural expressions of a mind imbued with Grecian thought and ideals concerning womanhood. There is nothing surprising in Paul's observations on the sphere of woman; they were the reflex of the conservative and prevailing thought among the civilizations with which he was familiar. But the world has outgrown this ancient conception, and it is worse than folly to attempt to fasten the corpse of the past to the living body of the present. The evolution of society, a growing sense of justice in man, and the exigencies of life are rapidly diminishing the old-time reverence for the Pauline theory of woman's sphere. This is nowhere more significantly illustrated than in the expressed declaration of tens of thousands of pious, Christian women, and the active participation of a smaller number in public affairs, who would indignantly resent any intimation that they did not accept the plenary inspiration of the Bible.* The declarations of Paul, while in harmony with accepted ideas in his day, are absurd, and inapplicable to our age and generation, and as such are being discarded by enlightened public sentiment, as was the old theory of a flat earth finally given up after science fully exposed its falsity. Another duty of woman is to unitedly contend for the right of suffrage for those who wish to exercise it. There may have been a time when there was no pressing duty involved in this question, but that day has passed. Recent statistics show that there are in the United States to-day millions of women who earn a livelihood by their own individual exertions;† tens of thousands of these women are working for

The hundreds of earnest organizers in the great reform movements of to-day; the sincere and profoundly religious women who preach the Christian gospel every Sunday; the leaders in the great temperance organizations who are also leaders in various Orthodox churches, have, in spite of their predjudices and the old-time faith which is often more a legacy from the past than the result of a many-sided investigation, yielded to the demands of their age, the crying needs of the hour, and in defiance of the dogmatic injunctions of Paul, have entered the vineyard of practical reform, while still maintaining the anomalous position of defending the verbal inspiration of the New Testament. This singularly illogical position, however, is always met with in a transition period, when a larger and more purposeful life is struggling with time-hallowed traditions and the memories and teachings made almost sacred by the childlike acceptation of loved parents, and teachers who have vanished down the vale.

It has been variously estimated by careful statisticians that we have from 2,500,000 to 3,000,000 girls and women in the United States who are making their own livings. The Commissioner of Labor, in his report for 1885, estimated that in New York City alone, there are over 200,000 employed in various wage-earning vocations. Mr. Carroll D. Wright's fourth annual report in the U. S. Bureau of Labor gives the results of statistics gathered from twenty-two cities of women engaged in manual labor, not including the great army engaged in professional and semi-professional voca

starvation wages, with the awful alternative ever before them "starve or sin." This condition will remain until women have a voice in the government equal to man's, and their numbers are so organized as to challenge the consideration of law-makers. The infamous "age of consent laws" which place the age of consent to her own ruin from seven to twelve years for girls could only be enacted in man-governed States. A noteworthy illustration of this is found in the fact that Wyoming, the only State where woman enjoys full franchise, has placed the age of consent at the legal age of majority, eighteen years, while Kansas, the State which more than any other approaches Wyoming in bestowing on women the rights of franchise, and where she exercises a greater influence in politics than any other American commonwealth save her younger sister, has also placed the age of consent at eighteen years. All the other States trail the banner of morality in the dust before the dictates of man's bestiality.

In the various spheres of activity in which woman has engaged, her influence has been that of a purifying, refining, and ennobling power, and barring rare instances where the spirit of intolerance has flashed forth, her presence in public affairs has been uniformly beneficent.

For womanhood I cherish the deepest love and reverence. Her exaltation means the elevation of the race. A broader liberty and more liberal meed of justice for her mean a higher civilization, and the solution of weighty and fundamental problems which will never be equitably adjusted until we have brought into political and social life more of the splendid spirit of altruism, which is one of her most conspicuous characteristics. I believe that morality, education, practical reform, and enduring progress wait upon her complete emancipation from the bondage of fashion, prejudice, superstition, and conservatism.

tions, as something near 300,000, but the glaring discrepancy in the figures as they relate to the Empire City, shown by Helen Campbell, discredits the report. Certain it is that in the cities mentioned if one begins at the scrub women and passes through the various occupations, such as boarding-house keepers, millinery, dressmaking, cash girls, clerks, sales-women, stenographers, type-writers, book-keepers, teachers, factory girls, and slaves of the clothing trade, as well as the artists, musicians, actresses, public speakers, physicians, lawyers, and the many other professions or vocations filled by women, that the number would be swelled to the millions. The last census returns for New York City reveal the fact that there are twentyseven thousand married men in New York who are supported by their wives, who are mainly dressmakers, milliners, boarding-house keepers, artists, teachers, musicians, and actresses. Here we have an army of shiftless, dependent men, more than a quarter of one hundred thousand strong, having each a vote to cast or perchance to sell to the highest bidder, while the real bread-winners, the actual wealth-producers, in this case have no voice in the legislative halls.

At times woman has shown a spirit of intolerance born of the intensity of her conviction which has led many thoughtful men and women to seriously question whether the right of suffrage might not prove a curse rather than a blessing, ending in repressive legislation and religions persecutions. I do not, however, fear these evils. The intensity of convictions is a compliment to her heart; and her innate love of justice and fair-play, would, I think, in a reasonably short time, expand the intellectual vision which prejudice and ancient thought has long obscured. Let the outcome, however, be it what it may, we have no right to argue on lines of policy, when a question of right or justice is involved. It is simple justice for every woman to exercise the right of franchise who desires to so enjoy it, and this should be sufficient to settle the question in the minds of those who believe in according to others what is demanded for themselves.

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