Let it not be
concluded
that I wish to invert the order of
things.
things.
Warner - World's Best Literature - v27 - Wat to Zor
Though some churls at our mirth repine,
Round your foreheads garlands twine;
Drown sorrow in a cup of wine,
And let us all be merry.
Now every lad is wondrous trim,
And no man minds his labor;
Our lasses have provided them
A bagpipe and a tabor.
Young men and maids and girls and boys
Give life to one another's joys,
And you anon shall by their noise
Perceive that they are merry.
Rank misers now do sparing shun,
Their hall of music soundeth;
And dogs thence with whole shoulders run,
So all things here aboundeth.
The country folk themselves advance,
For Crowdy-mutton's come out of France;
And Jack shall pipe, and Jill shall dance,
And all the town be merry.
Ned Swash hath fetched his bands from pawn,
And all his best apparel ;
Brisk Nell hath bought a ruff of lawn
With droppings of the barrel.
And those that hardly all the year
Had bread to eat or rags to wear,
Will have both clothes and dainty fare,
And all the day be merry.
The wenches with their wassail-bowls
About the street are singing;
The boys are come to catch the owls
The wild mare in is bringing.
Our kitchen-boy hath broke his box;
And to the dealing of the ox
Our honest neighbors come by flocks,
And here they will be merry.
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16128
GEORGE WITHER
Then wherefore in these merry days
Should we, I pray, be duller ?
No: let us sing our roundelays
To make our mirth the fuller;
And whilest thus inspired we sing,
Let all the streets with echoes ring :
Woods, and hills, and everything
Bear witness we are merry.
FOR SUMMER-TIME
N"
ow the glories of the year
May be viewed at the best,
And the earth doth now appear
In her fairest garments dressed:
Sweetly smelling plants and flowers
Do perfume the garden bowers;
Hill and valley, wood and field,
Mixed with pleasure profits yield.
Much is found where nothing was;
Herds on every mountain go;
In the meadows flowery grass
Makes both inilk and honey Aow.
Now each orchard banquets giveth;
Every hedge with fruit relieveth;
And on every shrub and tree
Useful fruits or berries be.
Walks and ways which winter marred,
By the winds are swept and dried;
Moorish grounds are now so hard
That on them we safe may ride;
Warmth enough the sun doth lend us,
From his heat the shades defend us.
And thereby we share in these,
Safety, profit, pleasure, ease.
Other blessings, many more,
At this time enjoyed may be,
And in this my song therefore
Praise I give, O Lord! to thee:
Grant that this my free oblation
May have gracious acceptation,
And that I may well employ
Everything which I enjoy.
## p. 16129 (#475) ##########################################
16129
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT
(1759-1797)
M
ARY WOLLSTONECRAFT might be regarded as the embodiment
of the finer and saner forces of the French Revolution; or
rather of that spirit through which the eighteenth century
was merged into the nineteenth, and which expressed itself as much
in the lives of individuals as in revolutions. The author of the
(Vindication of the Rights of Women' was perhaps the most pro-
phetic character of her time; since she alone, in a generation rabid
for the rights of man, understood the subtle truth that the emancipa-
tion of men is largely dependent upon the
emancipation of women,- seeing that the
unity of the sexes transcends their diver-
sity.
Her troubled life was in many ways a
preparation for her pioneership in the vin-
dication of womanliness. She was literally
badgered into the office of apostle. Her
experiences forced her into extreme opin-
ions, especially on the subject of marriage;
but extreme opinions were necessary in the
eighteenth century. She was born in the piv-
otal period of the age of Light, in the year
1759. Family troubles had begun long be- MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT
fore her birth; and she found herself ham-
pered in infancy with a good-for-nothing father, and a mother who
submitted to be beaten by him. She was the second of six children,
all of whom in later years were to depend upon her to aid them
in their struggles with the world. The passion of pity - for it was
less a sentiment than a passion with her — was early developed; her
motherhood, begun in the care of her wretched parents and their
helpless offspring, was later to include the race.
Her childhood was spent in a vagrancy which might well have
demoralized a less earnest spirit. The irresponsible father was always
moving his family from one town to another in the hope of better
luck. They went from Hoxton to Edmonton; thence to Essex; from
Essex to Beverley in Yorkshire; then to London. Mary had snatches of
education in these places: books however were kept strictly subordi-
nate to life, through the vagaries of her father. Her first stimulus to
cultivation was received through a young girl, Fanny Blood, for whom
she conceived a romantic affection. Her friend's accomplishments
XXVII-1009
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16130
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT
9
awakened her spirit of emulation. With her, love was synonymous
with growth and expression. In whatever form it expressed itself, it
was the mainspring of her character; which is indeed most clearly
intelligible through the medium of her affections.
In 1780 her mother died, worn out by the brutalities of her hus-
band. Mary went for a time to the home of Fanny Blood, where she
supported herself by needlework. Her friend's father, like her own
father, made his household wretched through his dissipations. From
childhood Mary Wollstonecraft had had before her the spectacle of
unhappy marriages, made so by the tyranny of the husbands. The
long and dreary courtship of her friend Fanny, by a man who played
with her love; the miserable union of her sister Eliza with a man
whose caprice and selfishness finally drove his wife into insanity, -
were further to increase her sense of outrage against a social system
under which such evils could exist, and to prepare her for her cham-
pionship of her sex. She first threw down the gauntlet to conven-
tional opinion when she helped her sister Eliza to escape from her
husband's roof. In so doing she displayed those forces of character
which were afterwards to inspire the Vindication': the love of just-
ice, the hatred of oppression, indomitable courage, and above all, a
fund of common-sense which amounted to genius.
The two sisters and Fanny Blood opened a school at Newington
Green, which at first was successful. About this time Mary was
introduced to Dr. Johnson, who seems to have had some appreciation
of her extraordinary powers. In 1785 Fanny Blood married her un-
certain lover, and went with him to Lisbon. A few months later,
Mary followed her there to nurse her in what proved to be her last
illness. After the death of her beloved friend she commemorated
their friendship in her first novel, — Mary: a Fiction. ' On her return
to England she gave up her school, and accepted the position of gov-
erness in the family of Lord Kingsborough in Ireland. After holding
this a year, she became a “reader” for the publisher Johnson, in
London: it was owing to his encouragement that she resolved to give
herself up entirely to literary work. She translated Salzmann's Ele-
ments of Morality) from the German, and Lavater's Physiognomy)
from the French; besides writing some tales for children, published
as Original Stories from Real Life,' with illustrations by Blake.
In 1789 Burke's Reflections on the French Revolution,' written
from the standpoint of a Tory and a Conservative, aroused great in-
dignation among the Liberals of England. Its scorn of the common
people and their rights, its support of tradition merely as tradi-
tion, outraged the spirit of justice and mercy which dwelt continually
with Mary Wollstonecraft. She published a pamphlet entitled Vin-
dication of the Rights of Man, in which she challenged the assump-
tions of Burke with more zeal perhaps than discretion, but with a
## p. 16131 (#477) ##########################################
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT
16131
wonderful passion for truth and charity, liberty and advancement.
Amid the emotional confusions of the pamphlet, the clear outlines of
logic can here and there be traced. Referring to Burke's reliance on
mediæval precedent for authority, she asks: “Does Burke recommend
night as the fittest time to analyze a ray of light ? »
The Vindication of the Rights of Women,' on which Mary Woll-
stonecraft's reputation as an author rests, was published in 1792.
Although now little read, — its assertions, so startling in the last cen-
tury, having become truisms in this, — it must be ranked among the
epoch-making books. It is the prophecy of the nineteenth century by
a woman who endured the tyranny of the eighteenth over her sex.
In her dedication of the work to Talleyrand, she sets forth its argu-
ment:—“Contending for the rights of woman, my main argument
is built on this simple principle,— that if she be not prepared by edu-
cation to become the companion of man, she will stop the progress
of knowledge; for truth must be common to all, or it will be ineffi-
cacious with respect to its influence on the general practice. ”
The book as a whole is an elaborate demonstration of this prin-
ciple. The author contends that no great improvement of society
can be expected, unless women are regarded by men not as dolls
made for their pleasure, but as rational beings on whose nobility of
character the welfare of the family — and through the family, of the
State-depends. She uncovers the falsity of Rousseau's ideal of
women, as mere ministrants to the sentimentality of men; and pro-
ceeds to show that this ideal, governing the education of girls, has
made them the inferior irrational beings which men find them. She
urges as remedies, the freer mingling of the sexes in childhood,
more out-of-door life for girls, and the training them to look upon
marriage not as a means of support, or as a coveted dignity, but
as the highest expression of love and friendship. She emphasizes the
necessity of this friendship, which depends upon the intellectual con-
geniality of husband and wife. She affirms that intellectual compan-
ionship, indeed, is the chief as it is the lasting happiness of marriage.
It is difficult to believe that this reasonable and noble idea of
woman's place in the family should have aroused the resentment
of Hannah More, and of the majority of the English reading public.
But like all books which mark a step in advance of prevailing cus-
tom and sentiment, it had to undergo stoning by the mob. Mary
Wollstonecraft had uncovered the source of the frivolity of the
eighteenth century, the source also of its soullessness, its deadening
rationality: this was its contemptible view of women. It is small
wonder that she incurred the resentment of her generation.
In 1792 she went to Paris to study the phenomena of the French
Revolution, then in progress. She afterwards published the first vol-
ume of a work entitled (An Historical and Moral View of the Origin
## p. 16132 (#478) ##########################################
16132
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT
and Progress of the French Revolution. During her stay in Paris
she entered upon the tragedy of her life, which came to her through
her love for Gilbert Imlay, an American. His desertion of her,-
“my best friend and wife,” as he calls her in a business document,
- whatever it proved to the world, proved to those who knew the
integrity of Mary's character, that he was not able to appreciate the
honorableness of her love, nor the sublimed purity of her nature,–
a purity dangerous perhaps to society, through its rare and exquisite
quality.
In 1797 she became the wife of William Godwin, the author of
Political Equality,' — in his way also an idealist, who placed the
individual before society. The other-worldliness of the pair was
primeval. In this union Mary knew the first serenity of her short,
troubled life; but it was not to be of long duration. She died in the
year of her marriage, ten days after the birth of the daughter who
was to become the wife of Shelley.
She was more guided by reasonableness in her books than in her
life, which was ruled by her affections,— being, as she was, a woman
wholly womanly. Both her books and her life were necessary to her
generation, to reveal to it the unsuspected forces of which its ignor-
ance took little account in its estimate of the social order.
MODERN IDEAL OF WOMANHOOD
From (A Vindication of the Rights of Women'
Tº
ACCOUNT for and excuse the tyranny of man, many ingenious
arguments have been brought forward to prove that the two
sexes, in the acquirement of virtue, ought to aim at attain-
ing a very different character; or to speak explicitly, women are
not allowed to have sufficient strength of mind to acquire what
really deserves the name of virtue. Yet it should seem, allow-
ing them to have souls, that there is but one way appointed by
Providence to lead mankind to either virtue or happiness.
If then women are not a swarm of ephemeron triflers, why
should they be kept in ignorance under the specious name of
innocence ? Men complain, and with reason, of the follies and
caprices of our sex, when they do not keenly satirize our head-
strong passions and groveling vices. Behold, I should answer,
the natural effect of ignorance! The mind will ever be unstable
that has only prejudices to rest on, and the current will run with
destructive fury when there are no barriers to break its force.
Women are told from their infancy, and taught by the example
## p. 16133 (#479) ##########################################
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT
16133
((
of their mothers, that a little knowledge of human weakness,
justly termed cunning, softness of temper, outward obedience, and
a scrupulous attention to a puerile kind of propriety, will obtain
for them the protection of man; and should they be beautiful,
everything else is needless, for at least twenty years of their
lives.
Thus Milton describes our first frail mother; though when he
tells us that women are formed for softness and sweet attract-
ive grace, I cannot comprehend his meaning, - unless in the true
Mahometan strain, he meant to deprive us of souls, and insinuate
that we were beings only designed, by sweet attractive grace and
docile blind obedience, to gratify the senses of man when he can
no longer soar on the wing of contemplation.
How grossly do they insult us who thus advise us only to ren-
der ourselves gentle domestic brutes! For instance, the winning
softness so warmly and frequently recommended, that governs by
obeying. What childish expressions; and how insignificant is the
being — can it be an immortal one? — who will condescend to
govern by such sinister methods! “Certainly,” says Lord Bacon,
!
man is of kin to the beasts by his body; and if he be not of kin
to God by his spirit, he is a base and ignoble creature. ” Men,
indeed, appear to me to act in a very unphilosophical manner,
when they try to secure the good conduct of women by attempt-
ing to keep them always in a state of childhood. Rousseau was
more consistent when he wished to stop the progress of reason
in both sexes: for if men eat of the tree of knowledge, women
will come in for a taste; but from the imperfect cultivation
which their understandings now receive, they only attain a
knowledge of evil.
Children, I grant, should be innocent; but when the epithet is
applied to men or women, it is but a civil term for weakness.
For if it be allowed that women were destined by Providence to
acquire human virtues, and by the exercise of their understand-
ings that stability of character which is the firmnest ground to
rest our future hopes upon, they must be permitted to turn to
the fountain of light, and not forced to shape their course by the
twinkling of a mere satellite. Milton, I grant, was of a very
different opinion, for he only bends to the indefeasible right of
beauty; though it would be difficult to render two passages which
I now mean to contrast, consistent. But into similar inconsisten-
cies are great men often led by their senses.
а
## p. 16134 (#480) ##########################################
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MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT
((
“To whom thus Eve, with perfect beauty adorned:-
My author and disposer, what thou bid'st
Unargued I obey: so God ordains;
God is thy law, thou mine : to know no more
Is woman's happiest knowledge and her praise. ”
These are exactly the arguments that I have used to children:
but I have added, Your reason is now gaining strength, and till
it arrives at some degree of maturity you must look up to me
for advice; then you ought to think, and only rely on God.
Yet in the following lines Milton seems to coincide with me,
when he makes Adam thus expostulate with his Maker:-
“Hast thou not made me here thy substitute,
And these inferior far beneath me set ?
Among unequals what society
Can sort, what harmony or true delight?
Which must be mutual, in proportion due
Given and received; but in disparity
The one intense, the other still remiss
Cannot well suit with either, but soon prove
Tedious alike: of fellowship I speak,
Such as I seek, fit to participate
All rational delight. ”
In treating therefore of the manners of women, let us, dis-
regarding sensual arguments, trace what we should endeavor to
make them in order to co-operate — if the expression be not too
bold — with the Supreme Being.
By individual education I mean - for the sense of the word is
not precisely defined — such an attention to a child as will slowly
sharpen the senses, form the temper, regulate the passions as
they begin to ferment, and set the understanding to work before
the body arrives at maturity; so that the man may only have
to proceed, not to begin, the important task of learning to think
and reason.
To prevent any misconstruction, I must add that I do not be-
lieve that a private education can work the wonders which some
sanguine writers have attributed to it. Men and women must
be educated, in a great degree, by the opinions and manners of
the society they live in. In every age there has been a stream
of popular opinion that has carried all before it, and given a fam-
ily character, as it were, to the century. It may then fairly be
inferred that till society be differently constituted, much cannot
## p. 16135 (#481) ##########################################
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT
16135
save
rea-
be expected from education. It is however sufficient for my pres-
ent purpose to assert, that whatever effect circumstances have on
the abilities, every being may become virtuous by the exercise
of its own reason; for if but one being was created with vicious
inclinations,—that is, positively bad,- what can
—
us from
atheism ? or if we worship a God, is not that God a devil ?
Consequently, the most perfect education, in my opinion, is
such an exercise of the understanding as is best calculated to
strengthen the body and form the heart; or in other words, to
enable the individual to attain such habits of virtue as will render
it independent. In fact, it is a farce to call any being virtuous
whose virtues do not result from the exercise of its own
son. This was Rousseau's opinion respecting men: I extend it to
women, and confidently assert that they have been drawn out
of their sphere by false refinement, and not by an endeavor to
acquire masculine qualities. Still, the regal homage which they
receive is so intoxicating, that until the manners of the times are
changed, and formed on more reasonable principles, it may be
impossible to convince them that the illegitimate power which
they obtain by degrading themselves is a curse, and that they
must return to nature and equality if they wish to secure the
placid satisfaction that unsophisticated affections impart. But
for this epoch we must wait; wait perhaps till kings and nobles,
cnlightened by reason, and preferring the real dignity of man to
childish state, throw off their gaudy hereditary trappings; and if
then women do not resign the arbitrary power of beauty — they
will prove that they have less mind than man.
I may be accused of arrogance: still I must declare what I
firmly believe, that all the writers who have written on the
subject of female education and manners, from Rousseau to Dr.
Gregory, have contributed to render women more artificial weak
characters than they would otherwise have been; and conse-
quently more useless members of society. I might have expressed
this conviction in a lower key; but I am afraid it would have
been the whine of affectation, and not the faithful expression of
my feelings,- of the clear result which experience and reflec-
tion have led me to draw. When I come to that division of the
subject, I shall advert to the passages that I more particularly
disapprove of, in the works of the authors I have just alluded
to; but it is first necessary to observe that my objection extends
to the whole purport of those books, which tend in my opinion to
5
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## p. 16136 (#482) ##########################################
16136
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT
degrade one half of the human species, and render women pleas-
ing at the expense of every solid virtue.
Though, to reason on Rousseau's ground, if man did attain a
degree of perfection of mind when his body arrived at maturity,
it might be proper, in order to make a man and his wife one,
that she should rely entirely on his understanding; and the grace-
ful ivy, clasping the oak that supported it, would form a whole
in which strength and beauty would be equally conspicuous. But
alas! husbands, as well as their helpmates, are often only over-
grown children, - nay, thanks to early debauchery, scarcely men
in their outward form, - and if the blind lead the blind, one need
not come from heaven to tell us the consequence.
Many are the causes that, in the present corrupt state of soci.
ety, contribute to enslave women by cramping their understand-
ings and sharpening their senses. One, perhaps, that silently does
more mischief than all the rest, is their disregard of order.
To do everything in an orderly manner is a most important
precept, which women — who, generally speaking, receive only a
disorderly kind of education — seldom attend to with that degree
of exactness that men, who from their infancy are broken into
method, observe. This negligent kind of guesswork — for what
other epithet can be used to point out the random exertions of
a sort of instinctive common-sense never brought to the test of
reason ? - prevents their generalizing matters of fact; so they do
to-day what they did yesterday, merely because they did it yester-
day.
This contempt of the understanding in early life has more
baneful consequences than is commonly supposed: for the little
knowledge which women of strong minds attain is, from various
circumstances, of a more desultory kind than the knowledge of
men; and it is acquired more by sheer observations on real life
than from comparing what has been individually observed with
the results of experience generalized by speculation.
by speculation. Led by
their dependent situation and domestic employments more into
society, what they learn is rather by snatches; and as learning
is with them in general only a secondary thing, they do not
pursue any one branch with that persevering ardor necessary to
give vigor to the faculties and clearness to the judgment. In the
present state of society, a little learning is required to support
the character of a gentleman, and boys are obliged to submit to
a few years of discipline. But in the education of women, the
## p. 16137 (#483) ##########################################
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT
16137
cultivation of the understanding is always subordinate to the
acquirement of some corporeal accomplishment. Even while ener.
vated by confinement and false notions of modesty, the body is
prevented from attaining that grace and beauty which relaxed
half-formed limbs never exhibit. Besides, in youth their faculties
are not brought forward by emulation; and having no serious
scientific study, if they have natural sagacity it is turned too
soon on life and manners. They dwell on effects and modifica-
tions, without tracing them back to causes; and complicated rules
to adjust behavior are a weak substitute for simple principles.
As a proof that education gives this appearance of weakness
to females, we may instance the example of military men; who
are, like them, sent into the world before their minds have been
stored with knowledge or fortified by principles. The conse-
quences are similar: soldiers acquire a little superficial knowl-
edge, snatched from the muddy current of conversation; and from
continually mixing with society, they gain what is termed a
knowledge of the world: and this acquaintance with manners
and customs has frequently been confounded with a knowledge
of the human heart. But can the crude fruit of casual observa-
tion, never brought to the test of judgment formed by comparing
speculation and experience, deserve such a distinction ? Soldiers,
as well as women, practice the minor virtues with punctilious
politeness. Where is, then, the sexual difference when the edu-
cation has been the same ? . All the difference that I can discern
arises from the superior advantage of liberty, which enables the
former to see more of life.
It is wandering from my present subject, perhaps, to make a
political remark; but as it was produced naturally by the train
of my reflections, I shall not pass it silently over.
Standing armies can never consist of resolute, robust men;
they may be well-disciplined machines, but they will seldom con-
tain men under the influence of strong passions, or with very
vigorous faculties: and as for any depth of understanding, I will
venture to affirm that it is as rarely to be found in the army as
amongst women. And the cause, I maintain, is the same.
be further observed that officers are also particularly attentive to
their persons, fond of dancing, crowded rooms, adventures, and rid-
icule. * Like the fair sex, the business of their lives is gallantry:
* Why should women be censured with petulant acrimony because they
seem to have a passion for a scarlet coat ? Has not education placed them
more on a level with soldiers than any other class of men ?
It may
## p. 16138 (#484) ##########################################
16138
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT
they were taught to please, and they only live to please. Yet
they do not lose their rank in the distinction of sexes, for they
are still reckoned superior to women; though in what their supe-
riority consists, beyond what I have just mentioned, it is difficult
to discover.
The great misfortune is this: that they both acquire manners
before morals, and a knowledge of life before they have from re-
flection any acquaintance with the grand ideal outline of human
nature. The consequence is natural. Satisfied with common
nature, they become a prey to prejudices, and taking all their
opinions on credit, they blindly submit to authority. So that
if they have any sense, it is a kind of instinctive glance that
catches proportions, and decides with respect to manners, but fails
when arguments are to be pursued below the surface, or opin-
ions analyzed.
May not the same remark be applied to women ? Nay, the
argument may be carried still further, for they are both thrown
out of a useful station by the unnatural distinctions established
in civilized life. Riches and hereditary honors have made
ciphers of women to give consequence to the numerical figure;
and idleness has produced a mixture of gallantry and despot-
ism into society, which leads the very men who are the slaves
of their mistresses to tyrannize over their sisters, wives, and
daughters. This is only keeping them in rank and file, it is
true. Strengthen the female mind · by enlarging it, and there
will be an end to blind obedience; but as blind obedience is
ever sought for by power, tyrants and sensualists are in the right
when they endeavor to keep women in the dark, because the
former only want slaves and the latter a plaything. The sensu-
alist, indeed, has been the most dangerous of tyrants; and women
have been duped by their lovers, as princes by their ministers,
whilst dreaming that they reigned over them.
I now principally allude to Rousseau; for his character of
Sophia is undoubtedly a captivating one, though it appears to me
grossly unnatural. However, it is not the superstructure but the
foundation of her character, the principles on which her educa-
tion was built, that I mean to attack; nay, warmly as I admire
the genius of that able writer, whose opinions I shall often have
occasion to cite, indignation always takes place of admiration,
and the rigid frown of insulted virtue effaces the smile of com-
placency which his eloquent periods are wont to raise, when I
read his voluptuous reveries. Is this the man who, in his ardor
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MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT
16139
for virtue, would banish all the soft arts of peace, and almost
carry us back to Spartan discipline? Is this the man who de.
lights to paint the useful struggles of passion, the triumphs of
good dispositions, and the heroic Alights which carry the glowing
soul out of itself? How are these mighty sentiments lowered
when he describes the pretty foot and enticing airs of his little
favorite!
But for the present I waive the subject; and instead of severely
reprehending the transient effusions of overweening sensibility,
I shall only observe that whoever has cast a benevolent eye on
society must often have been gratified by the sight of humble
mutual love, not dignified by sentiment or strengthened by a
union in intellectual pursuits. The domestic trifles of the day
have afforded matters for cheerful converse, and innocent caresses
have softened toils which did not require great exercise of mind
or stretch of thought; yet has not the sight of this moderate
felicity excited more tenderness than respect ? - an emotion simi-
lar to what we feel when children are playing or animals sport-
ing;* whilst the contemplation of the noble struggles of suffering
merit has raised admiration, and carried our thoughts to that
world where sensation will give place to reason.
Women are therefore to be considered either as moral beings,
or so weak that they must be entirely subjected to the superior
faculties of men.
Let us examine this question. Rousseau declares that
woman should never for a moment feel herself independent; that
she should be governed by fear to exercise her natural cun-
ning, and made a coquettish slave in order to render her a more
alluring object of desire, a sweeter companion to man whenever
he chooses to relax himself. He carries the arguments, which he
pretends to draw from the indications of nature, still further; and
insinuates that truth and fortitude, the corner-stones of all human
virtue, should be cultivated with certain restrictions, because, with
a
* Similar feelings has Milton's pleasing picture of paradisiacal happiness
ever raised in my mind; yet instead of envying the lovely pair, I have with
conscious dignity or Satanic pride turned to hell for sublimer objects. In the
same style, when viewing some noble monument of human art, I have traced
the emanation of the Deity in the order I admired, till, descending from that
giddy height, I have caught myself contemplating the grandest of all human
sights; for fancy quickly placed in some solitary recess an outcast of fortune,
rising superior to passion and discontent.
## p. 16140 (#486) ##########################################
16140
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT
respect to the female character, obedience is the grand lesson
which ought to be impressed with unrelenting rigor.
What nonsense! When will a great man arise with sufficient
strength of mind to puff away the fumes which pride and sensu-
ality have thus spread over the subject? If women are by nature
inferior to men, their virtues must be the same in quality, if not
in degree, or virtue is a relative idea; consequently their conduct
should be founded on the same principles, and have the same
aim.
Connected with man as daughters, wives, and mothers, their
moral character may be estimated by their manner of fulfilling
those simple duties; but the end, the grand end, of their exer-
tions should be to unfold their own faculties, and acquire the
dignity of conscious virtue. They may try to render their road
pleasant; but ought never to forget, in common with man, that
life yields not the felicity which can satisfy an immortal soul. I
do not mean to insinuate that either sex should be so lost in
abstract reflections, or distant views, as to forget the affections
and duties that lie before them, and are in truth the means
appointed to produce the fruit of life; on the contrary, I would
warmly recommend them, even while I assert that they afford
most satisfaction when they are considered in their true sober
light.
Probably the prevailing opinion that woman was created for
man may have taken its rise from Moses's poetical story; yet
as very few, it is presumed, who have bestowed any serious
thought on the subject, ever supposed that Eve was, literally
speaking, one of Adam's ribs, the deduction must be allowed to
fall to the ground, or only be so far admitted as it proves that
man, from the remotest antiquity, found it convenient to exert
his strength to subjugate his companion, and his invention to
show that she ought to have her neck bent under the yoke, be-
cause the whole creation was only created for his convenience or
pleasure.
Let it not be concluded that I wish to invert the order of
things. I have already granted that from the constitution of
their bodies, men seemed to be designed by Providence to attain
a greater degree of virtue. I speak collectively of the whole
sex; but I see not the shadow of a reason to conclude that their
virtues should differ in respect to their nature. In fact, how can
they, if virtue has only one eternal standard ? I must therefore,
## p. 16141 (#487) ##########################################
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT
16141
if I reason consequentially, as strenuously maintain that they have
the same simple direction as that there is a God.
It follows then that cunning should not be opposed to wis-
dom; little cares to great exertions; or insipid softness, varnished
over with the name of gentleness, to that fortitude which grand
views alone can inspire.
I shall be told that woman would then lose many of her
peculiar graces; and the opinion of a well-known poet might be
quoted to refute my unqualified assertion. For Pope has said, in
the name of the whole male sex:
“Yet ne'er so sure our passion to create
As when she touched the brink of all we hate. »
In what light this sally places men and women, I shall leave
to the judicious to determine. Meanwhile, I shall content myself
with observing that I cannot discover why, unless they are mor-
tal, females should always be degraded by being made subservient
to love or lust.
To speak disrespectfully of love is, I know, high treason against
sentiment and fine feelings; but I wish to speak the simple lan-
guage of truth, and rather to address the head than the heart.
To endeavor to reason love out of the world would be to out-
Quixote Cervantes, and equally offend against common-sense; but
an endeavor to restrain this tumultuous passion, and to prove
that it should not be allowed to dethrone superior powers, or
to usurp the sceptre which the understanding should ever coolly
wield, appears less wild.
Youth is the season for love in both sexes; but in those days
of thoughtless enjoyment, provision should be made for the more
important years of life, when reflection takes place of sensation.
But Rousseau, and most of the male writers who have followed
his steps, have warmly inculcated that the whole tendency of
female education ought to be directed to one point, - to render
them pleasing
Let me reason with the supporters of this opinion who have
any knowledge of human nature. Do they imagine that marriage
can eradicate the habitude of life? The woman who has only
been taught to please will soon find that her charms are oblique
sunbeams, and that they cannot have much effect on her hus-
band's heart when they are seen every day — when the summer
is past and gone.
Will she then have sufficient native energy to
## p. 16142 (#488) ##########################################
16142
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT
look into herself for comfort, and cultivate her dormant faculties?
or is it not more rational to expect that she will try to please
other men, and in the emotions raised by the expectation of new
conquests, endeavor to forget the mortification her love or pride
has received ? When the husband ceases to be a lover,- and the
time will inevitably come,- her desire of pleasing will then grow
languid, or become a spring of bitterness; and love, perhaps the
most evanescent of all passions, gives place to jealousy or vanity.
I now speak of women who are restrained by principle or prej-
udice. Such women, though they would shrink from an intrigue
with real abhorrence, yet nevertheless wish to be convinced
by the homage of gallantry that they are cruelly neglected by
their husbands; or days and weeks are spent in dreaming of the
happiness enjoyed by congenial souls, till their health is under-
mined, and their spirits broken by discontent. How then can
the great art of pleasing be such a necessary study? It is only
useful to a mistress. The chaste wife and serious mother should
only consider her power to please as the polish of her virtues,
and the affection of her husband as one of the comforts that
render her task less difficult and her life happier. But whether
she be loved or neglected, her first wish should be to make her-
self respectable, and not to rely for all her happiness on a being
subject to like infirmities with herself.
The worthy Dr. Gregory fell into a similar error. I respect
his heart, but entirely disapprove of his celebrated Legacy to
his Daughters. '
He advises them to cultivate a fondness for dress, because a
fondness for dress, he asserts, is natural to them. I am unable
to comprehend what either he or Rousseau mean when they
frequently use this indefinite term. If they told us that in a
pre-existent state the soul was fond of dress, and brought this
inclination with it into a new body, I should listen to them with
a half-smile, as I often do when I hear a rant about innate
elegance. But if he only meant to say that the exercise of the
faculties will produce this fondness, I deny it. It is not natural;
but arises, like false ambition in men, from a love of power.
Dr. Gregory goes much further: he actually recommends dis-
simulation; and advises an innocent girl to give the lie to her
feelings, and not dance with spirit, when gayety of heart would
make her feet eloquent without making her gestures immodest.
In the name of truth and common-sense, why should not one
## p. 16143 (#489) ##########################################
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT
16143
woman acknowledge that she can take more exercise than another,
or in other words, that she has a sound constitution ? And why,
to damp innocent vivacity, is she darkly to be told that men will
draw conclusions which she little thinks of ? Let the libertine draw
what inference he pleases, but I hope that no sensible mother
will restrain the natural frankness of youth by instilling such
indecent cautions. Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth
speaketh; and a wiser than Solomon hath said that the heart
should be made clean, and not trivial ceremonies observed, which
it is not very difficult to fulfill with scrupulous exactness when
vice reigns in the heart.
Women ought to endeavor to purify their heart; but can they
do so when their uncultivated understandings make them entirely
dependent on their senses for employment and amusement ? when
no noble pursuit sets them above the little vanities of the day,
or enables them to curb the wild emotions that agitate a reed
over which every passing breeze has power ? To gain the affec-
tions of a virtuous man, is affection necessary ? Nature has given
woman a weaker frame than man; but to insure her husband's
affections, must a wife, who by the exercise of her mind and
body whilst she was discharging the duties of a daughter, wife,
and mother, has allowed her constitution to retain its natural
strength, and her nerves a healthy tone,- is she, I say, to con-
descend to use art, and feign a sickly delicacy, in order to secure
her husband's affection ? Weakness may excite tenderness, and
gratify the arrogant pride of man; but the lordly caresses of a
protector will not gratify a noble mind that pants for and de-
serves to be respected. Fondness is a poor substitute for friend-
ship.
In a seraglio, I grant that all these arts are necessary; the
epicure must have his palate tickled, or he will sink into apa-
thy: but have women so little ambition as to be satisfied with
such a condition? Can they supinely dream life away in the lap
of pleasure, or the languor of weariness, rather than assert their
claim to pursue reasonable pleasures, and render themselves con-
spicuous by practicing the virtues which dignify mankind ? Surely
she has not an immortal soul who can loiter life away merely
employed to adorn her person, that she may amuse the languid
hours and soften the cares of a fellow-creature, who is willing to
be enlivened by her smiles and tricks when the serious business
of life is over.
## p. 16144 (#490) ##########################################
16144
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT
Besides, the woman who strengthens her body and exercises
her mind will, by managing her family and practicing various
virtues, become the friend and not the humble dependent of her
husband; and if she, by possessing such substantial qualities,
merit his regard, she will not find it necessary to conceal her
affection, nor to pretend to an unnatural coldness of constitution
to excite her husband's passions. In fact, if we revert to history,
we shall find that the women who have distinguished themselves
have neither been the most beautiful nor the most gentle of their
sex.
Nature – or to speak with strict propriety, God — has made
-
all things right; but man has sought him out many inventions
to mar the work. I now allude to that part of Dr. Gregory's
treatise where he advises a wife never to let her husband know
the extent of her sensibility or affection. Voluptuous precaution,
and as ineffectual as absurd. Love, from its very nature, must
be transitory. To seek for a secret that would render it con-
stant would be as wild a search as for the philosopher's stone,
or the grand panacea; and the discovery would be equally use-
less, or rather pernicious, to mankind. The most holy band of
society is friendship. It has been well said by a shrewd satirist
that Rare as true love is, true friendship is still rarer. ”
(
»
## p. 16145 (#491) ##########################################
16145
GEORGE EDWARD WOODBERRY
(1855-)
SHEN a volume of verse entitled (The North Shore Watch, and
Other Poems' was printed in 1883 for private circulation, it
was recognized by those who chanced to see it as work of
exceptional merit. The Elegy which named the book was felt to be
one of the most artistic and beautiful composed by an American: the
high spiritual quality of the song was as marked as its dignity of
diction and depth of feeling. There were noble sonnets in the little
collection, — the two on Gibraltar, for example; and classical and
patriotic pieces which proclaimed a poet
whose quiet insistence on form, and con-
servative avoidance of strained expression,
made him all the more acceptable to those
who believe in inviolable literary traditions.
Since this modest but genuinely poetic
volume appeared, a second edition in 1893
has testified to the recognition of its writer,
Professor George E. Woodberry, as one of
the purest of the younger American lyric
poets. His work is academic in a good
sense; it is, too, wholesomely though un-
obtrusively American — with the American-
ism of a Lowell, not of a Jingo. Professor G. E. WOODBERRY
Woodberry's prose likewise is that of an
informed scholar, an artist sensitive to the delicacies and graces of
language, a thinker with a grasp on general principles. Some years
after the first appearance of the poems, was published Studies in
Letters and Life' (1890), made up of literary papers contributed to
the Atlantic and the Nation. These essays and appreciations are
excellent examples of really suggestive, sane, and attractive criticism.
The writer's critical faculty is also illustrated in his admirable Life
of Poe) in the American Men of Letters) series; and he has writ-
ten the perceptive and judicious biographical sketch of Poe for the
definitive edition of that poet made in conjunction with Mr. Edmund
Clarence Stedman. Few American scholars of the more recent school
unite as does Professor Woodberry, literary culture and facility with
the judgment, breadth of outlook, and ideal standard which insure
criticism of the atmospheric sort.
XXVII—IOIO
## p. 16146 (#492) ##########################################
16146
GEORGE EDWARD WOODBERRY
George E. Woodberry was born at Beverly, Massachusetts, May
12th, 1855; and was educated at Phillips Academy, Exeter, New Hamp-
shire, and at Harvard, whence he was graduated in 1877. During
the years 1877–79 and 1880-82 he was professor of English Literature
in the Nebraska State University. This Western residence broadened
Professor Woodberry's conception of what the United States stands
for and is. Since 1891 he has occupied the chair of professor of Lit-
erature at Columbia University, in New York city. After graduat-
ing from Harvard, he was for a short time on the editorial staff of
the New York Nation. At Columbia his influence has been a stimu-
lus to the nobler ideals of literature and life; while his poems on set
occasions, academic or other, have been adequate, and such as to
enhance his reputation. Whether as a writer of prose or verse, Pro-
fessor Woodberry's work has dignity, taste, and imaginative worth.
[The following poems are all copyrighted by George Edward Woodberry, and
are reprinted by permission of the author, and of Houghton, Mifflin &
Co. , publishers. ]
AT GIBRALTAR
I
E
NGLAND, I stand on thy imperial ground,
Not all a stranger: as thy bugles blow,
I feel within my blood old battles flow,-
The blood whose ancient founts in thee are found.
Still surging dark against the Christian bound
Wide Islam presses; well its peoples know
Thy heights that watch them wandering below;
I think how Lucknow heard their gathering sound.
I turn, and meet the cruel, turbaned face.
England, 'tis sweet to be so much thy son!
I feel the conqueror in my blood and race:
Last night Trafalgar awed me, and to-day
Gibraltar wakened; hark, thy evening gun
Startles the desert over Africa!
II
Thou art the rock of empire, set mid-seas
Between the East and West, that God has built;
Advance thy Roman borders where thou wilt,
While run thy armies true with his decrees:
## p. 16147 (#493) ##########################################
GEORGE EDWARD WOODBERRY
16147
Law, justice, liberty,- great gifts are these;
Watch that they spread where English blood is spilt,
Lest, mixed and sullied with his country's guilt,
The soldier's life-stream flow, and Heaven displease!
Two swords there are: one naked, apt to smite,-
Thy blade of war; and, battle-storied, one
Rejoices in the sheath, and hides from light.
American I am: would wars were done!
Now westward, look, my country bids good-night -
Peace to the world from ports without a gun!
FROM (MY COUNTRY)
O
DESTINED Land, unto thy citadel,
What founding fates even now doth peace compel,
That through the world thy name is sweet to tell!
O thronèd Freedom, unto thee is brought
Empire,-nor falsehood nor blood-payment asked;
Who never through deceit thy ends hast sought,
Nor toiling millions for ambition tasked:
Unlike the fools who build the throne
On fraud, and wrong, and woe;
For man at last will take his own,
Nor count the overthrow;
But far from these is set thy continent,
Nor fears the Revolution in man's rise;
On laws that with the weal of all consent,
And saving truths that make the people wise.
For thou art founded in the eternal fact
That every man doth greaten with the act
Of freedom; and doth strengthen with the weight
Of duty; and diviner molds his fate,
By sharp experience taught the thing he lacked,
God's pupil: thy large maxim framed, though late,
Who masters best himself best serves the State.
This wisdom is thy Corner; next the stone
Of Bounty: thou hast given all; thy store
Free as the air, and broadcast as the light,
Thou flingest: and the fair and gracious sight,
More rich, doth teach thy sons this happy lore,-
That no man lives who takes not priceless gifts
Both of thy substance and thy laws, whereto
## p. 16148 (#494) ##########################################
16148
GEORGE EDWARD WOODBERRY
He may not plead desert, but holds of thee
A childhood title, shared with all who grew -
His brethren of the hearth: whence no man lifts
Above the common right his claim; nor dares
To fence his pastures of the common good:
For common are thy fields; common the toil,
Common the charter of prosperity,
That gives to each that all may blessèd be.
This is the very counsel of thy soil.
Therefore if any thrive mean-souled, he spares
The alms he took: let him not think subdued
The State's first law, that civic rights are strong
But while the fruits of all to all belong;
Although he heir the fortune of the earth,
Let him not hoard, nor spend it for his mirth,
But match his private means with public worth.
That man in whom the people's riches lie
Is the great citizen, in his country's eye.
Justice the third great base, that shall secure
To each his earnings, howsoever poor,
From each his duties, howsoever great;
She bids the future for the past atone.
Behold her symbols on the hoary stone, -
The awful scales, and that war-hammered beam
Which whoso thinks to break doth fondly dream,
Or Czars who tyrannize or mobs that rage;
These are her charge, and heaven's eternal law.
She from old fountains doth new judgment draw,
Till, word by word, the ancient order swerves
To the true course more nigh; in every age
A little she creates, but more preserves.
Hope stands the last, a mighty prop of fate.
These thy foundations are, O firin-set State!
And strength is unto thee
More than this masonry
Of common thought;
Beyond the stars, from the Far City brought.
Pillar and tower
Declare the shaping power,
Massive, severe, sublime,
Of the stern, righteous time,
From sire to son bequeathed, thy eldest dower.
Large-limbed they were, the pioneers,
Cast in the iron mold that fate reveres;
## p. 16149 (#495) ##########################################
GEORGE EDWARD WOODBERRY
16149
They could not help but frame the fabric well,
Who squared the stones for Heaven's eye to tell;
Who knew from eld and taught posterity.
That the true workman's only he
Who builds of God's necessity.
Nor yet hath failed the seed of righteousness;
Still doth the work the awe divine confess,-
Conscience within, duty without, express.
Well may thy sons rejoice thee, () proud Land:
No weakling race of mighty loins is thine,
No spendthrifts of the fathers; 10, the Arch,
The loyal keystone glorying o'er the march
Of millioned peoples freed! on every hand
Grows the vast work, and boundless the design.
So in thy children shall thy empire stand,
As in her Cæsars fell Rome's majesty –
O Desolation, be it far from thee!
Forgetting sires and sons, to whom were given
The seals of glory and the keys of fate,
From Him whom well they knew the Rock of State,
Thy centre, and on thy doorposts blazed his name
Whose plaudit is the substance of all fame,
The sweetness of all hope — forbid it, Heaven!
Shrink not, O Land, beneath that holy fear!
Thou art not mocked of God;
His kingdom is thy conquering sphere,
His will thy ruling rod!
O Harbor of the sea-tossed fates,
The last great mortal bound;
Cybele, with a hundred States,
A hundred turrets, crowned;
Mother, whose heart divinely holds
Earth's poor within her breast;
World-Shelterer, in whose open folds
The wandering races rest:
Advance! the hour supreme arrives;
O'er ocean's edge the chariot drives;
The past is done;
Thy orb begun;
Upon the forehead of the world to blaze,
Lighting all times to be, with thy own golden days.
O Land beloved !
My Country, dear, my own!
## p. 16150 (#496) ##########################################
16150
GEORGE EDWARD WOODBERRY
May the young heart that moved
For the weak words atone;
The mighty lyre not mine, nor the full breath of song!
To happier sons shall these belong.
Yet doth the first and lonely voice
Of the dark dawn the heart rejoice,
While still the loud choir sleeps upon the bough;
And never greater love salutes thy brow
Than his, who seeks thee now.
Alien the sea and salt the foam
Where'er it bears him from his home:
And when he leaps to land,
A lover treads the strand;
Precious is every stone;
No little inch of all the broad domain
But he would stoop to kiss, and end his pain,
Feeling thy lips make merry with his own;
But oh, his trembling reed too frail
To bear thee Time's All Hail!
Faint is my heart, and ebbing with the passion of thy praise !
The poets come who cannot fail;
Happy are they who sing thy perfect days!
Happy am I who see the long night ended,
In the shadows of the age that bore me,
All the hopes of mankind blending,
Earth awaking, heaven descending,
While the new day steadfastly
Domes the blue deeps over thee!
Happy am I who see the Vision splendid
In the glowing of the dawn before me,
All the grace of heaven blending,
Man arising, Christ descending,
While God's hand in secrecy
Builds thy bright eternity.
LINES
NO"
Ow snowy Apennines shining
Should breathe my spirit bare;
My heart should cease repining
In the rainbow-haunted air:
But cureless sorrow carries
My heart beyond the sea,
## p. 16151 (#497) ##########################################
GEORGE EDWARD WOODBERRY
16151
Nor comfort in it tarries
Save thoughts of thee.
The branch of olive shaken
Silvers the azure sea;
Winds in the ilex waken:
Oh, wert thou here with me,
Gray olive, dark ilex, bright ocean,
The radiant mountains round,
Never for love's devotion
Were sweeter lodging found!
SODOMA'S (CHRIST SCOURGED)
I
SAW in Siena pictures,
Wandering wearily;
I sought not the names of the masters
Nor the works men care to see;
But once in a low-ceiled passage
I came on a place of gloom,
Lit here and there with halos
Like saints within the room.
The pure, serene, mild colors
The early artists used
Had made my heart grow softer,
And still on peace I mused.
Sudden I saw the Sufferer,
And my frame was clenched with pain;
Perchance no throe so noble
Visits my soul again.
Mine were the stripes of the scourging;
On my thorn-pierced brow blood ran;
In my breast the deep compassion
Breaking the heart for man.
I drooped with heavy eyelids,
Till evil should have its will;
On my lips was silence gathered;
My waiting soul stood still.
I gazed, nor knew I was gazing;
I trembled, and woke to know
Him whom they worship in heaven
Still walking on earth below.
## p. 16152 (#498) ##########################################
16152
GEORGE EDWARD WOODBERRY
Once have I borne his sorrows
Beneath the flail of fate!
Once, in the woe of his passion,
I felt the soul grow great!
I turned from my dead Leader!
I passed the silent door;
The gray-walled street received me:
On peace I mused no more.
SONG
From Agathon
W**
HEN love in the faint heart trembles,
And the eyes with tears are wet,
Oh, tell me what resembles
Thee, young Regret?
Violets with dewdrops drooping,
Lilies o'erfull of gold,
Roses in June rains stooping,
That weep for the cold,
Are like thee, young Regret.
Bloom, violets, lilies, and roses !
But what, young Desire,
Like thee, when love discloses
Thy heart of fire ?
The wild swan unreturning,
The eagle alone with the sun,
The long-winged storm-gulls burning
Seaward when day is done,
Are like thee, young Desire.
## p. 16153 (#499) ##########################################
16153
MARGARET L. WOODS
(1859-)
HE
“obscure cry of human suffering ” is the motive of Mrs.
Woods's first book, A Village Tragedy. ' The story is
simple, the incidents meagre; but so admirable is its con-
struction, with such sureness is the ethical problem presented, if not
solved, so great is the author's power to create illusion by the state-
ment of uncolored facts, that the sombre, hopeless tale at once takes
hold of the reader, who follows its conclusion with gloomy satisfac-
tion. In its quiet, unemotional pages a terrible and inevitable tragedy
is presented; illustrating Taine's doctrine that virtue and vice are
products no less than sugar and wine, and that a man's character is
formed by his blood and nerves. The humor of the book, bitter and
riin, is contrasted with a pathos reduced to its lowest terms in point
of language, only made intense by a look or a gesture. The luxury
of grief, the cries and moans, are not there; the facts of a perfectly
supposable case are set before the reader in simple narrative. (A
Village Tragedy' is real with something of the reality of Defoe's
Plague of London. '
Small as is the canvas of A Village Tragedy,' we are subtly
aware that the author selected it from choice, and can draw with a
free hand and large conception. Her next book, Esther Vanhom-
righ, is painted out of doors with unlimited space. In construction
alone is there evidence that these novels are the work of the same
hand. The painstaking veracity and the truthfulness to detail so
manifest in her first book, are lost in the rapid action of Vanessa's
story,
,-a modern theme thrown into a past century, creating an atmo-
sphere, reconstructing a period. The background is filled with vig-
orous portraits, with the life of London, the talk of the tavern and
the town; historical and imaginary characters walk across the stage
bold and unafraid; and the sense of proportion, of values, that makes
a picture, - that constructive ability shown in the earlier work,-
fixes each part in its proper relation to the whole. No incident, no
minor character subordinates the central figures where the light is
focused. Swift is a historical Swift brought to life again; Stella is a
fine cut, cameo-like portrait. Esther is a study of the passion of love;
not delicate or ethereal love, but the passion of a rich, full nature,
painted as some great marine painters paint the sea, blown upon
by the wind. The surge of emotion, the tumult of jealousy, the
## p. 16154 (#500) ##########################################
16154
MARGARET L. WOODS
intricacies of wounded feeling, the coming and going of despair and
hope, the final and desperate appeal,- all these motions of the mind
toss and froth before us like the surface of a strong sea.
(The Vagabonds) is a return in form to the earlier manner of A
Village Tragedy,' but enlivened by an undercurrent of quiet humor,
and broadened by a philosophy which teaches that the inequalities of
fortune are generally external, and that things adjust themselves in
the practical and patient life. As A Village Tragedy reproduces the
country town, "The Vagabonds) carries us, open-eyed and eager,
behind the scenes of a traveling circus: we do not say how good this
is; the sense of local color is wanting because it is part of the atmo-
sphere, and no more to be set apart to look at or comment on than is
one ingredient of a loaf of bread to be separated from the rest. The
commonplace people in their conventional distresses are interesting
because they are human. Not situation but character is dramatically
presented,— its niceties shaded like the blush on a peach, from pale
to red. Such minute observation, such discriminating insight, tempt
the reader to wonder whether Fritz in “The Vagabonds) and Aunt
Pontin in A Village Tragedy,' both minor but most entertaining
characters, are portraits or original conceptions. Whatever they
are, the author has succeeded in seizing and fixing on her canvas
what in other hands would be fugitive impressions or mere puppets
of illusion.
There are many well-established modes of writing fiction; but not
to the familiar philo-natural school, as M. Brunetière calls it, nor to
the psychological, nor to that of the symbolists, does Mrs. Woods
belong. Nor are her books panoramas of manners and life in an
extended sense, although a high estimate may be set on her fine
imaginative power to reconstruct the past. Her métier is to paint
human nature, and to show the universality of human experience. To
no external condition belong honor, generosity, pride, cruelty, faith,
or self-sacrifice. Acrobats and clowns, peasants, scholars, ladies of
fashion, men of the world, are moved by the same emotions, the
same sorrows. Under the canvas walls of the circus tent, in the sor-
did country village, in the London of Swift and Vanessa, the human
heart beats to the same music.
In her creed, environment is destiny. Even such dramatic cli-
maxes as the death of Esther Vanhomrigh, the finding of the body of
Annie in A Village Tragedy,' and Joe in The Vagabonds) saving
the life of his rival whom he hates, are evolved from a chain of
events. Her people, drawn on broad lines, but with infinite discrimi-
nation, and ability to recognize and reproduce subtle distinctions,
work out their own salvation with results as certain as a problem in
mathematics.
## p. 16155 (#501) ##########################################
MARGARET L. WOODS
16155
In the matter of style, Mrs. Woods has accepted Boileau's dictum
that as the mind of man teems with confused ideas, he “likes noth-
ing better than to have one of these ideas well elucidated and clearly
presented to him. ” And for her reward she has helped to make
English literature human.
Margaret L. Woods was born in London in 1859, the daughter of
Dean Bradley of Westminster. Early in life she married Dr. Woods,
the president of Trinity College, Oxford.
