Of Mothers, of Daughters, of Wives…

In speaking of mothers, of daughters, of wives, we should like to turn a moment or two to the place of women in the world.
Of course in some respects it has so greatly shifted—so greatly that greatly seems almost too weak a word. One of the more far-reaching revolutions of a revolutionary century has been the change in attitudes and activities and opportunities of women. But still there are some things women must continue to be, what ever else they are, as here expressed in Ruskin’s words: “I would have them desire and claim the title of Lady, provided they claim, not merely the title, but the office and duty signified by it. These words from a century or so ago, should be—must be—in our time, in all times, no less significant. For “it is the woman who…teaches, and guides,” and who is somehow looked to to sustain the standards that lift our lives.
It should be no less so with men. The commandments are unto all. Virtue and a clean life are to be lived by all. There is a single standard to which men and women will both be held accountable. But the sterner pursuits of men frequently leave to women the refining influences.
Ruskin says that “Shakespeare has no heroes…only heroines”—and represents women as “just and pure examples—strong always to sanctify, even when they cannot save…” “Men, by their nature, are prone to fight…It is for you [the wives and mothers] to choose their cause for them.” As to injustice, violence, and misery, “Men can bear the sight of it,” he said, “but you [the wives and mothers] should not be able to bear it…It is you only who can feel the depths of pain; and conceive the way of its healing… You… are answerable… not in that you have provoked, but in that you have not hindered….” Thus wrote Ruskin.
Now as to what this adds up to by way of summarizing sentences: just this—that in the changed place and position of women there are some things she must not lose, some things which to the world, to every born child into it, to all of us, are sacredly essential. And even in her changed, and, in some ways, emancipated place, women cannot afford to take the vices of men. Men should not—but the daughters, the wives, the mothers of men must keep themselves as something better than the common run of life—as something better than the average of what all of us together are.