The history of the condition of women, in various ages and nations (vol. 2 of 2) : $b Comprising the women of Europe, America, and South Sea IslandsChild, Lydia Maria
History
The history of the condition of women, in various ages and nations (vol. 2 of 2) : $b Comprising the women of Europe, America, and South Sea Islands
Child, Lydia Maria
Women -- History; Women -- Social conditions
In searching the history of women, the mild, unobtrusive domestic
virtues, which constitute their greatest charm, and ought always to be
the ground-work of their character, are not found on record. We hear of
storms and tempests, and northern lights; but men do not describe the
perpetual blessing of sunshine.
The personal bravery evinced by women at all periods excites surprise.
We hear scarcely any thing of the Phœnician women, except that they
agreed to perish in the flames, if their countrymen lost a certain
battle, and that they crowned with flowers the woman who first made
that motion in the council. The Moorish women of Spain were full of
this fiery spirit. When Boabdil wept at taking a farewell glance of
beautiful Granada, his proud-hearted mother said, scornfully, “You do
well to weep for it like a woman, since you would not defend it like a
man.”
The old Hungarian women, when their country was invaded by the Turks,
performed prodigies of valor; and now, among the predatory tribes of
Illyria and Dalmatia, he who attempted to insult a girl, would find
that she wore a dagger and pistol at her belt. But Christianity, which
has done so much for woman--which, at a time when its pure maxims
could produce nothing better, by reason of man’s own evils, brought
forth the generous spirit of chivalry from the iron despotism of the
middle ages--Christianity is removing the garlands from the bloody
front of war, and teaching her sons and her daughters that evil must be
“overcome with good.”
Women are apt to be more aristocratic than men; for the habits of their
life compel attention to details, and consequently make them more
observing of manners than of principles.
Where the Mohammedan religion prevails, man’s reason is taught to bow
blindly to faith, and his affections have little freedom to seek their
corresponding truth; in all such countries women are slaves.
At those periods when reason has run wild, and men have maintained that
there was no such thing as unchangeable truth, but that every one made
it, according to the state of his own will--at such times, there has
always been a tendency to have men and women change places, that the
latter might command armies and harangue senates, while men attended
to domestic concerns. These doctrines were maintained by infidels of
the French revolution, and by their modern disciple, Fanny Wright.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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