Page:History of Woman Suffrage Volume 1.djvu/580

554 These are far more bitterly hostile than the men of small proportions, who are willing to have a great woman tower above them from time to time—as a Madame de Stael. Such a case, however, they would rank as an exception, not admit as a rule. To allow women to stand every day in the foremost lines of intellect and ability, is a thought altogether too expansive to be entertained by them.

Such are the oppositions we meet; but they are all melting down like frost-work before the morning sun. The day is dawning when the intellect of woman shall be recognized as well as that of man, and when her rights shall meet an equal and cordial acknowledgment. The greatest wrong and injustice ever done to woman is that done to her intellectual nature. This, like Goliath among the Philistines, overtops all the rest. Drones are but the robbers of the hive; ladies educated to no purpose are but surfeited to a dronish condition on the sweets of literature. Such minds are not developed, but molded in a fashionable pattern.

said: It has been stated that we women were not fit for anything but to stay in the house! I look over the events of the last five years, and almost smile at the confutation of this statement which they supply. Let it not be supposed that I wish to depreciate the value of house-duties, or the worth of the woman who fitly discharges them. No! I think that any woman who stands on the throne of her own house, dispensing there the virtues of love, charity, and peace, and sends out of it into the world good men, who may help to make the world better, occupies a higher position than any crowned head. However, we said women could do more; they could enter the professions, and there serve society and do themselves honor. We said that women could be doctors of medicine. Well, we can now prove the statement by fact. Harriot K. Hunt is among us to-day, who, by recognized attainment and successful practice, has shown that women can be physicians, and good ones. You have in your city two women who are good physicians; there are female medical colleges, with their classes, as well ordered, and showing as good a proficiency as any classes of men. Thus that point is gained. It was said women could not be merchants. We thought they could; we saw nothing to prevent women from using the power of calculation, the knowledge of goods, and the industry necessary to make a successful trader. Here, again, we have abundant examples. Many women could be pointed to whose energy and ability for business have repaired the losses of their less competent husbands, I will mention a particular case. Mrs. Tyndal, of Lowell, Mass., has for years carried on business in a quiet way; she has made herself rich by conducting a ladies' shoe store in Lowell. She said to herself: "What is to hinder me from going into this business? I should know ladies' shoes, whether they were good or bad, and what price they can bring. The ladies should support me." And so they did, and that woman has given a proof that her sex does not incapacitate for successful mercantile operations.

It is said women could not be ministers of religion. Last Sunday, at Metropolitan Hall, Antoinette L. Brown conducted divine service, and was joined in it by the largest congregation assembled within the walls of any building in this city. (Hisses). Some men hiss who had no