A Cry Unto Womankind

There are plenty to say and to hear the saying, "The world is God's, not theirs: let Him work out a change if change must be." Take thine ease under thy own vine or fig tree; let the world rush on its way to sorrow, to sin, to shame. What should such a fragile form as thine do to stop or stay it? Let truth fill in the streets, let virtue wander homeless till its feet take hold of the steps that lead down to destruction; what should such a delicate hand as thine do to arrest or save it? Soil it by no such contact.

Let gilded hells be opened on all sides to lure thy sons and thy neighbors' sons to gamble away their earnings, the support of a home; to draw them to arms that will embrace only to poison, sending them back to innocent and unconscious arms that will be poisoned in turn; to put to the mouths of the weak in will, the strong in appetite, that that will destroy body and brain, reason and conscience, home and happiness, heart and soul, together. What shouldst thou know of such matters? To know is to be contaminated; keep thy ignorance, and thy womanly charm together. Let government go to rack, let commerce and society conspire to accomplish evil, let lives be blasted and hearts be broken, and souls be damned. What are these to thee? Thy sole duty is as a violet to smell sweet, as a flute to sound fine harmonies.

And yet, sir, and yet, madam, God created this woman, not a flower, not a flute, but a living soul; as such to receive help, and to yield help to all other living souls; to it intrusted seed to sow, talents to multiply, work to be done. O, my sisters! the world is groaning and travailing in pain until this day, crying out of the darkness wherein it gropes, out of the anguish in which it writhes, for your hands and help and care. Where, then, are your woman's hearts and your woman's conscience that you are silent and still? Go you to the asylums and the hospitals, and make of them homes. Go to the jails, the prisons, [...]