A serious proposal to the Ladies, for the advancement of their true and greatest interest (In Two Parts)Astell, Mary
Religion
A serious proposal to the Ladies, for the advancement of their true and greatest interest (In Two Parts)
Astell, Mary
Feminism -- Great Britain -- History -- 18th century -- Sources; Women's rights -- Great Britain -- History -- 18th century -- Sources
To wind up all; The Sum of our Duty and of all Morality, is to have a
Temper of Mind so absolutely Conform’d to the Divine Will, or which is
the same in other words, such an Habitual and Intire Love to GOD, as
will on all occasions excite us to the Exercise of such Acts, as are
the necessary consequents of such a Habit. This frame and Constitution
of Soul is what we must all our Life time Labour after, it is to be
begun, and some Proficiency made in it whilst we stay on Earth, and
then we may joyfully wait for its Consummation in Heaven, the reason
why we cannot be perfectly Happy whilst we tarry here, being only
because we can have this Temper but Imperfectly. The want of which is
the Hell of the Damn’d, the degree of their misery bearing a proportion
to their opposition to the Divine Will. For Happiness is not _without_
us, it must be found in our own Bosoms, and nothing but a Union with
GOD can fix it there; nor can we ever be United to Him any other wise
than by being like Him, by an Intire Conformity to his Will.
Now she who has obtain’d this blessed Temper, whose Will is Right, and
who has no Passion but for GOD’s Service, is pleas’d that his Wisdom
shou’d Chuse her Work, and only prepares to dispatch it with the
greatest Diligence and Chearfulness. She keeps All his Precepts, and
does not pick and Chuse such as are for her turn, and most agreeable
to her own Humor; but as she does every thing for His Sake, so is she
easy and pleas’d under all his Dispensations; is truly indifferent to
Applause, and fully content with GOD’s Approbation. Indeed the Conquest
of our Vanity is one of our last Triumphs, and a Satisfaction in all
GOD’s Choices for us, from a full Conviction that they are most for our
advantage, the best Test of a Regular Will and Affections. For these
are heights to which we can’t arrive till we have travers’d over all
the Paths of Vertue, and when once our Passions are reduc’d to this, I
know not in what they can oppose us.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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