Page:The Education and Employment of Women.djvu/19

19 hope—remove disabilities imposed by the stronger portion of society upon the weaker.

What do we lose by the abandonment of national exclusiveness? Is labour demoralized because slaves are free? Does service cease when servitude is at an end? Common sense alone, without the help of historical knowledge, might lead us to suppose that women will not do their special work in the world worse, but better, when justice shall be done them. It is in the name of Christ that the removal of burdens and disabilities is preached: much wisdom might be learned regarding some of these matters if people would look more closely at this, and note that this is the Person in whom all virtues which are considered essentially womanly, as well as those which are considered essentially manly, found their perfect development. A little meditation on this double truth—that in Christ all distinctions are done away, and that in Him, nevertheless, were exhibited in perfect beauty the distinctive virtues of the feminine character—would suggest some lessons which the world has been very slow to learn, would tend to remove groundless fears regarding the consequences of the abandonment of many unreasonable and unchristian theories which prevail, and to counteract the materialistic doctrine which has sunk too deep into the heart of our so-called Christian community, a doctrine which amounts to this, that "the weaker races, classes, persons must struggle on unaided, and if they are trampled down and die out, the fact proves that it is better for the world that they should perish, so only a stronger and higher stock will remain;" a doctrine of which we see the fruits in our wickednesses in Asia, &c., and