as they were shut up in castles and when they were the booty chiefly sought in war. To-day a woman may circumnavigate the world alone and yet be unmolested. Our marriage laws and customs are changing to meet these new conditions. It will not do to give the husband of the modern woman power to whip his wife, "provided the stick he uses is not larger than his finger;" to give him the right to will away her unborn child; to have control over her property; to make all the laws under which she is to live; adjudicate all her penalties; try her before juries of men; conduct her to prison under the care of men; cast the ballot for her; and in general, hold her in the estate of a perpetual minor. It will not do to let the modern man determine the age of "consent," settle the penalties that men should suffer whose indignities and outrages upon women are worse than death, and by his exclusive power to make all laws and choose all officers, judicial and executive, thus leaving his own case wholly in his own hands. To continue this method is to make it as hard as possible for men to do right, and as easy as possible for them to do wrong; the magnificent possibilities of manly character are best prophesied from the fact that under such a system so many men are good and gracious. My theory of marriage in its relation to society would give this postulate. Husband and wife are one, and that one is husband and wife. I believe they will never come to the heights of purity, of power and peace, for which they were designed in Heaven, until this better law prevails. One undivided hali of the world for wife and husband equally; coeducation to mate them on the plane of mind; equal property rights to make her God's own free woman, not coerced into marriage for the sake of support, nor a bond-slave after she is married, who asks her master for the price of a paper of pins, and gives him back the change; or, if she be a petted favorite, who owes the freedom of his purse wholly to his will and never to her right; woman left free to go her honored and self-respecting way as a maiden in perpetuo, rather than marry a man whose deterioration through the alcohol and nicotine habits is a deadly menace to herself and the descendants that such a marriage has invoked these are the outlooks of the future that shall make the marriage system, never a failure since it became monogamous, an assured, a permanent, a paradisaical success. Then comes the statelier Eden back to men, The reign the world's great bridals chaste and calm, May these things be, 1 The Solitude of Self. By ELIZABETH CADY STANTON, of New York. (Born 1815.) HE point I wish plainly to bring before you on this occasion is the individuality of each human soul; our Protestant idea; the right of individual conscience and judgment,- our republican idea; individual citizenship. In discussing the rights of woman, we are to consider first what belongs to her as an individual, in a world of her own, the arbiter of her own destiny, an imaginary Robinson Crusoe, with her woman Friday on a solitary island. Her rights, under such circumstances, are to use all her faculties for her own safety and happiness. Secondly, if we consider her as a citizen, as a member of a great nation, she must have the same rights as all other members, according to the fundamental principles of our Government. Thirdly, viewed as a woman, an equal factor in civilization, her rights and duties are still the same; individual happiness and development. Fourthly. It is only the incidental relations of life, such as mother, wife, sister, daughter, that may involve some special duties and training. In the usual discussion in regard to woman's sphere, such men as Herbert Spencer, Frederic Harrison, and Grant Allen uniformly subordinate her rights and duties as an individual, as a citizen, as a woman, to the necessities of these incidental relations, some of which a large class of women may never assume. In discussing the sphere of man, we do not decide his rights as an individual, as a citizen, as a man; by his duties as a father, a husband, a brother, or a son, relations, some of which he might never fill. Moreover, he would be better fitted for these very relations, and whatever special work he might choose to do, to earn his bread, by the complete development of all his faculties as an individual. Just so with woman. The education that will fit her to discharge the duties in the largest sphere of human usefulness, will best fit her for whatever special work she may be compelled to do. The isolation of every human soul, the necessity of self-dependence, must give each individual the right to choose her own surroundings. The strongest reason for giving women all the opportunities for higher education, for the full development of her faculties and forces of mind and body, for giving her the most enlarged freedom of thought and action; a complete emancipation from all forms of bondage, of custom, dependence, superstition; from all the crippling influences of fear, is the solitude and personal responsibility of her own individual life. The strongest reason why we ask for woman a voice in the Government, under which she lives; in the religion she is asked to believe; equality in social life, where she is the chief factor; a place in the trades and professions, where she may earn her bread, is because of her birthright to self-sovereignty; because, as an individual, she must rely on herself. No matter how much women prefer to lean, to be protected and supported, nor how much men desire to have them do so, they must make the voyage of life alone, and for safety in an emergency, they must know something of the laws of navigation. To guide our own craft, we must be Captain, Pilot, Engineer; with chart and compass to watch at the wheel; to watch the winds and waves and know when to take in the sail; and to read the signs of coming storms in the firmament over all. It matters not whether the solitary voyager is man or woman. Nature having endowed them equally, leaves them to their own skill and judgment in the hour of danger, and if not equal to the occasion, alike they perish. To appreciate the importance of fitting every human soul for independent action, think for a moment of the immeasurable solitude of self. We come into the world alone, unlike all who have gone before us; we leave it alone, under circumstances peculiar to ourselves. No mortal ever has been, no mortal ever will be, like the soul just launched on the sea of life. There can never again be just such a combination of prenatal influences; never again just such environment as make up the infancy, youth, and manhood of this one. Nature never repeats itself, and the possibilities of one human soul will never be found in another. No one has ever found two blades of ribbon grass alike, and no one will ever find two human beings alike. Seeing, then, what must be the infinite diversity in human character, we can, in a measure, appreciate the loss to a nation, when any large class of the people is uneducated and unrepresented in the Government. We ask for the complete development of every individual, first for his own benefit and happiness. In fitting out an army we give each. soldier his own knapsack, arms, powder, his blanket, cup, knife, fork and spoon. We provide alike for all their individual necessities and then each man bears his own burden. On Again we ask complete individual development for the general good; for the consensus of the competent on the whole round of human interests all questions of national life; and here each man must bear his share of the general burden. It is sad to see how soon friendless children are left to bear their own burdens; before they can analyze their feelings, before they can even tell their joys and sorrows they are thrown on their own resources. The great lesson that Nature seems to teach us at all ages is self-dependence, selfprotection, and self-support. What a touching instance of a child's solitude, of that hunger of the heart for love and recognition, in the case of the little girl who helped to dress a Christmas tree for the children of the family in which she served. On finding there was no present for herself, she slipped away in the darkness and spent the night in an open field sitting on a stone, and when found in the morning, was weeping as if her heart would break. No mortal will ever know the thoughts that passed through the mind of that friendless child in the long hours of that cold night, with only the silent stars to keep her company. The mention of her case in the daily papers moved many generous hearts to send her presents but in the hours of her keenest suffering she was thrown wholly on herself for consolation. In youth our most bitter disappointments, our brightest hopes and ambitions are known only to ourselves, even our friendship and love we never fully share with another; there is something of every passion, in every situation we conceal. Alike in our triumphs and our defeats. The successful candidate for the Presidency and his opponent, each have a solitude peculiarly his own, and good form forbids either to speak of his pleasure or regret. The solitude of the King on his throne and the prisoner in his cell, differs in character and degree, but it is solitude nevertheless. We ask no sympathy from others in the anxiety and agony of a broken friendship or shattered love. When death sunders our nearest ties, alone we sit in the shadow of our affliction. Alike mid the greatest triumphs and darkest tragedies of life, we walk alone. On the divine heights. of human attainment, eulogized and worshipped as a hero, or saint, we stand alone. In ignorance, poverty and vice, as a pauper or criminal alone we starve or steal, alone we suffer the sneers and rebuffs of our fellows, alone we are hunted and wounded through dark courts and alleys, in by-ways and highways, alone we stand at the judgment seat, alone in the prison cell we lament our |