Page:Letters to a friend on votes for women.djvu/60

 of what women will become in some future age and in some undiscovered society which places them on a political equality with men; but he expresses a most unfavourable opinion of English women as he actually knew them in real life from, say, 1830 to 1873. He believes that 'disinterestedness in the general conduct of life, the devotion of the energies to purposes which hold out no promise of private advantage to the family, is very seldom encouraged or supported by women's influence.' He credits women with aversion to war and addiction to philanthropy, but to these excellent characteristics the influence of women more often than not, in his opinion, gives a direction which is as often mischievous as useful. In philanthropy, the two provinces chiefly cultivated by women are religious proselytism and charity. But then proselytism at home is a name for the embittering religious animosities, whilst abroad it is usually a blind running at an object without either knowing or heeding the fatal mischiefs, even as regards the propagation of religion itself, which may be produced by the means