Page:The Homes of the New World- Vol. I.djvu/224

 heart of woman; it is within her, around her, if she will but see it. But she must yet obtain a more profound knowledge both of herself and of life. The women who in all ages have stood forward as the priestesses of the inner life, as prophetesses and interpretesses of the most sublime and the most holy, and who were listened to as such by people and by kings, Deborah, Wala, Sybilla, merely naming in them some of the oldest types—these might point out to the women of the New World the path to public power and public influence. And if they do not feel this higher power in themselves, how much better to remain in quietness and silence! How powerful might they be even then! What power is mightier than that of love, than that of rational goodness? The eagle and the dove, as I have heard it said, are, of all birds, those which fly farthest and most rapidly to their object.

Miss Lucy Stone's audience were good-natured, listening attentively and applauding at the close of the speech, but not much. People praise her clearness of delivery, her becoming manner, and the perspicuity of her mind: that was all; more could not be said—and that was not much.

The gentlemen who followed her brought with them more life and interest. But they offended me by their want of moderation and justice; by their style of declamation; by their endeavouring to point out even in the galleries of the hall, individuals who did not agree with them in their anti-slavery labours; it offended me to hear family life desecrated by making known dissensions; for example, between the father and the daughter on these questions; thus overlooking the divine moral law of “Judge not!” These tirades were carried to an extreme and with much personality. But all was animated and amusing, and the best understanding seemed to exist between the speaker and his audience.—Wendel Phillips, the young lawyer,