[4] Rom. 16: 3, compare Gr. text of v. 21, 2. Cor. 8: 23; Phil. 2: 25; 1 Thes. 3: 2. LETTER XV. MAN EQUALLY GUILTY WITH WOMAN IN THE FALL. _Uxbridge, 10th Mo. 20th, 1837._ MY DEAR SISTER,--It is said that ‘modern Jewish women light a lamp every Friday evening, half an hour before sunset, which is the beginning of their Sabbath, in remembrance of their original mother, who first extinguished the lamp of righteousness,--to remind them of their obligation to rekindle it.’ I am one of those who always admit, to its fullest extent, the popular charge, that woman brought sin into the world. I accept it as a powerful reason, why woman is bound to labor with double diligence, for the regeneration of that world she has been instrumental in ruining. But, although I do not repel the imputation, I shall notice some passages in the sacred Scriptures, where this transaction is mentioned, which prove, I think, the identity and equality of man and woman, and that there is no difference in their guilt in the view of that God who searcheth the heart and trieth the reins of the children of men. In Is. 43: 27, we find the following passage--‘Thy first father hath sinned, and thy teachers have transgressed against me’--which is synonymous with Rom. 5: 12. ‘Wherefore, as by ONE MAN sin entered into the world, and death by sin, &c.’ Here man and woman are included under one term, and no distinction is made in their criminality. The circumstances of the fall are again referred to in 2 Cor. 11: 3--‘But I fear lest, by any means, as the serpent _beguiled_ Eve through his subtility, so your mind should be beguiled from the simplicity that is in Christ.’ Again, 1st Tim. 2: 14--‘Adam _was not deceived_; but the woman being _deceived_, was in the transgression.’ Now, whether the fact, that Eve was beguiled and deceived, is a proof that her crime was of deeper dye than Adam’s, who was not deceived, but was fully aware of the consequences of sharing in her transgression, I shall leave the candid reader to determine. My present object is to show, that, as woman is charged with all the sin that exists in the world, it is her solemn duty to labor for its extinction; and that this she can never do effectually and extensively, until her mind is disenthralled of those shackles which have been riveted upon her by a ‘_corrupt public opinion, and a perverted interpretation of the holy Scriptures_.’ Woman must feel that she is the equal, and is designed to be the fellow laborer of her brother, or she will be studying to find out the _imaginary_ line which separates the sexes, and divides the duties of men and women into two distinct classes, a separation not even hinted at in the Bible, where we are expressly told, ‘there is neither male nor female, for ye are all one in Christ Jesus.’