ing enters more largely into her opinions and judgments than the lumen siccum of pure reason,--a fact which in some departments makes her a more true and acute discerner, and in others a more partial and' prejudiced observer.

Now this marked difference of organization, both physical and mental, certainly indicates some difference of design and end touching the sphere and functions of the two sexes. What this difference is; which shall be the head, the primordial and governing force in all things pertaining to public and political life; and which shall be the heart, the inward and retired, but not less powerful spiritual force which animates and warms and cheers the domestic and social life; the controller of this interior world within the outer one of business and politics, like the heart in the physical system sustaining, shaping and building the body by its vital chemistry, pouring life and health through all the veins and arteries and so feeding and vitalizing the whole, the head and brain no less than the lowest members, this surely ought not to be a question in dispute, and cannot be to any level and true-seeing mind. Indeed this question whether women shall vote, and the issues connected with it, recalls the old fable of the belly and the members. It looks to us like the question, whether the heart shall usurp the func tion of the head, and assert its right to be at the top instead of at the center of the body; i. e. whether it shall govern and direct the external movements of the man, or animate and vitalize, and so inwardly ccntrol, the man himself. In this view there is a look of absurdity in the claim for woman suffrage which has not escaped the notice of some who have written on the subject. Prof. Phelps speaks in bold and convincing language of "the absurdity of thrusting upon one-half of the human race a privilege which they have never asked for, and their desire for which is a thing not proved; the absurdity of imposing upon one-half of the race a duty, the gravest that organized society creates, but which they have no power to defend in an emergency; the absurdity of holding woman to military service, as she must be held if she is to stand on any fair terms of equality with man in the possession of this natural right; the absurdity of the intermingling of the gravest duties of the court room and the senate chamber with those of the

nursery-these and other like things involved in the proposed revolution and its sequences, we claim to have the look of absurdity to the average sense of mankind. Yet they are commonly treated either flippantly or passionately in the attempt at rejoinder; and once and again we are told that the revolution is right because it is right; and it must succeed because it will. succeed. We ask for a reverent answer to St. Paul's reasoning, and we are informed that St. Paul was a bachelor. We ask what to do with the apostle's inspired command to wives, so marked in its distinction from his commands to husbands, and we are reminded that the apostle was a Jew. We urge the impossibility of woman's defending the ballot by force of arms; and we are answered that woman is a slave. We argue the incongruity of the duties of maternity with those of the jurybox and the bar; and we are instructed gravely that men are tyrants, usurpers, brutes. We speak of the dignity of marriage, and the sacredness of motherhood; and we are met with the discovery that woman has a mission."

4. The reform in question is a violation of woman's truest and deepest instincts, and so is truly a "reform against nature."

It is not implied by this there are not women who delight in publicity and who have a talent for affairs, and even for gov. ernment and leadership in the State; strong-minded and masculine women, as their very presence and boldness of address declare. Such are most of the leaders in this movement, generally single women thrown out of their true sexual relation by the abnormal force and independence of their nature, and seeking to find or make a place for their uncomfortable and irrepressible energies. The very names of some of these leaders give one an inward shudder when thought of in the relation of wife. But these, happily, are exceptions to the sex and do not represent woman as God made her to be, and as most women are. Such, when left to their own womanly instincts, and not forced out of them by sophistry or ambition, disclaim all sympathy with the movement, and would not vote if they could. Not assuming to be wiser than St. Paul, or stronger than nature, they acknowledge the headship of the husband as the ordinance of God, finding in it not tyranny but strength and peace. One of the best and noblest women we ever knew,

whose clearness and strength of intellect was equaled only by her strength and purity of affection-once said, "Women like to be controlled; it is woman's nature to be governed, and not to govern;" giving utterance to what every true woman knows in her inmost heart to be true. Said the late Prof. Maurice to a lady who was protesting against the required promise in the marriage service, to honor and obey her husband, "My dear Madam, you little know the blessedness of obedience." It is one of the chief mischiefs of the modern woman's rights doctrine, that it ignores and violates the deepest instincts of her nature, and calls subordination subjection (as in J. Stuart Mills' book entitled "The Subjection of Women,") obedience servility, and headship tyranny.

A most significant and hopeful sign in connection with this woman suffrage agitation, is the fact that so few women are in favor of the reform, or avail themselves of the limited suffrage allowed them in certain states and territories. A recent number of the New York Tribune, speaking of the reported working of woman suffrage in Wyoming Territory, says: "The most striking point in connection with woman suffrage is seen in Wyoming as well as elsewhere-the indifference of women themselves to the right. Even in school matters, in which those who do not favor a general suffrage for women would be glad to see them interest themselves, they do not seem to be active. In New York and Massachusetts, where women have a limited suffrage in school matters, the number exercising the right has been very small. In Vermont 15,000 tax-paying women have had the same rights for three years, but few have availed themselves of them. Only eight women voted in Burlington this year against sixteen the first year of the law, and a similar indisposition to take part even in school politics is reported from other quarters of the state. The advocates of woman suffrage are rejoicing over the probable approval by the Governor of Washington Territory of a woman suffrage law already passed, but Dakota, which will probably come first into the family of States, refused to put it into the proposed Constitution. The great obstacle everywhere, however, seems to be, the indifference or unwillingness of women rather than the opposition of men."

This proves conclusively that woman's instincts, always wiser than her reasonings, are against this theoretical reform advocated by the few whose instincts have been repressed and conquered by their will.

5. Apart from all physical disqualification for the duties of government and the so-called right of suffrage-which is too obvious to dwell upon-there is one argument grounded in woman's mental and moral constitution that is unanswerable. This is what may be termed the attraction of personality inseparable from her nature. Woman is nothing if not a respecter of persons. All questions to her are personal questions. This propensity is so well described by Mr. Hamerton in his Intellectual Life, that we quote his words: "A woman," he says, "can rarely detach her mind from questions of persons to apply it to questions of fact. She does not think simply, 'Is that true of such a thing?' but she thinks, 'Does he love me, or respect me?' This feeling in woman is far from being wholly egoistic. They refer everything to persons, but not necessarily to their own persons. Whatever you affirm as a fact, they find means of interpreting as loyalty or disloyalty to some person whom they either venerate or love, to the head of religion, or of the State, or of the family. Hence it is always dangerous to enter upon intellectual discussion of any kind with women, for you are almost certain to offend them by setting aside the sentiments of veneration, affection, love, which they have in great strength, in order to reach accuracy in matters of fact, which they neither have nor care for."

It is easy to see how this characteristic, which all must acknowledge to be true, disqualifies woman for impartial judgment of questions to be decided by the ballot, for sitting on juries, for the bench, and for almost all political action where measures and policies and not men are in question. It is no discredit to woman that this is so. It does not argue an inferior, but only a different type of mind and nature. Being formed for man, and not for the State, for clinging affection, and not for legislation or debate, persons are everything to her, and all questions and policies are of interest only in their individual and personal bearings. As Milton truly describes this difference:

"Not equal, as their sex not equal seemed:
For contemplation he and valor formed,
For softness she, and sweet attractive grace;

He for God only, she for God in him."

A good deal of shallow criticism has been expended on this last line, as well as on the argument of St. Paul touching the subordination of woman. But nowhere does the great poet show more clearly his deep insight into the nature of woman, and the divine philosophy of religion, than here. The attraction of personality of which we have spoken, woman's natural indifference to the abstract, the absolute, and the remote, and her craving for the personal and the concrete, together with the all-dominating sway of her affections, renders the one object of her love and reverence the natural medium of her religious adoration. This may explain, if not justify the old formula in the English marriage service-" With my body I thee worship," -taken doubtless from the 45th psalm: "For he is thy lord and worship thou him."

6. A last argument against woman suffrage is its practical consequences, or the evil results that will naturally follow such a social revolution. Only a few of these can be hinted at rather than described.

Not the least disastrous result would be the intolerable burden thrust upon women's shoulders by imposing political questions and duties in addition to those already borne. Domestic and social duties, never so onerous and distracting as now, the care and nurture of children, with the high and sacred responsibilities involved in these, are enough, and more than enough for most women in this age. To add to these the cares of public life and the turbulent excitements of politics, would be indeed to break the bruised reed. As has been well and truly said by a recent writer: "There is no country in which women enjoy such large and various liberty as with us; but it would be bold to say that American women as a whole are superior to those of other leading nations. In spite of these advantages a vast proportion of them fall immensely short of the influence and consideration that ought to belong to them. This proceeds from a variety of causes-an overstrained and nervous activity, an incessant tension of nerves, bred partly by