Page:Emma Goldman - Anarchism and Other Essays (2nd Rev. ed.) - 1911.djvu/267

262 Helmer with a safe lie—one that would remain hidden and not endanger his social standing.

When Nora closed behind her the door of her gilded cage and went out into the world a new, regenerated personality, she opened the gate of freedom and truth for her own sex and the race to come.

More than any other play, Ghosts has acted like a bomb explosion, shaking the social structure to its very foundations.

In Doll's House the justification of the union between Nora and Helmer rested at least on the husband's conception of integrity and rigid adherence to our social morality. Indeed, he was the conventional ideal husband and devoted father. Not so in Ghosts. Mrs. Alving married Captain Alving only to find that he was a physical and mental wreck, and that life with him would mean utter degradation and be fatal to possible offspring. In her despair she turned to her youth's companion, young Pastor Manders who, as the true savior of souls for heaven, must needs be indifferent to earthly necessities. He sent her back to shame and degradation,—to her duties to husband and home. Indeed, happiness—to him—was but the unholy manifestation of a rebellious spirit, and a wife's duty was not to judge, but "to bear with humility the cross which a higher power had for your own good laid upon you."

Mrs. Alving bore the cross for twenty-six long years. Not for the sake of the higher power, but for her little son Oswald, whom she longed to save from the poisonous atmosphere of her husband's home.

It was also for the sake of the beloved son that