Page:Woman's Record, Or, Sketches of All Distinguished Women.pdf/51

xxxvi own unassisted efforts, any good propensity or quality of his nature. Left to himself, his love becomes lust, patriotism, policy, and religion, idolatry. He is naturally selfish in his affections ; and selfishness is the sin of depravity. But woman was not thus cast down. To her was confided, by the Creator's express declaration, the mission of disinterested affection; her " desire" was to be to her husband—not to herself; she was endowed with the hope of the Good, which, in the fulness of time, developed by her seed, that is, by Christ, would make war with the Evil, and finally overcome Sin, Death, and the Grave.

And now let us turn to the holy Bible, the only record of truths which teach divine wisdom, for confirmation of this theory I have ventured to propound.

I entreat my readers, men, who I hope will read heedfully this preface, to lay aside, if possible, their prejudices of education, the erroneous views imbibed from poetical description? and learned commentaries, respecting the Creation and the Fall of Man. Go not to Milton, or the Fathers, but to the Word of God; and let us from it read this important history, the foundation of all true history of the natural character and moral condition of mankind.

"And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.

"So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.

"And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth."

Here we are instructed that the term man included woman ; the twain in unity, the female being the complement of the male, formed the perfect being made in the "likeness of God." Such was the recorded result of the human creation ; the particular process of the formation of man is afterwards described.

"And the Lord God made man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into him the breath of life; and man became a living soul."—Genesis, Chapter II., ver. 7.

The process of the creation of woman is detailed in the same chapter, verses 18, 21, 22, 23, 24.

"And the Lord God said, It is not good that man should be alone; I will make him an help meet for him.

"And the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam, and he slept: and he took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh instead thereof;

"And of the rib, which the Lord God had taken from man, made he a woman, and brought her unto the man.

"And Adam said, This is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called woman, because she was taken out of man.

"Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave to his wife: and they shall be one flesh."

Who can read this, and not fail to perceive that there was a care and preparation in forming woman which was not bestowed on man? Why was this recorded, if not to teach us that the wife was of finer mould, destined to the most spiritual offices,—the heart of humanity, as her husband was the head? She was the last work of creation. Every step, from matter to man, had been in the ascending scale Woman was the crown of all,—the last, and must therefore have been the best in those qualities which raise human nature above animal life; the link. which pressed nearest towards the angelic, and drew its chief beauty and strength from the invisible world."

Men, ay, good men, hold the doctrine of woman's inferiority, because St. Paul says she was created "for man." Truly she was made "for man," but not in the sense this text has