I am fully persuaded that the time is not far distant, when it will be thought almost incredible that the question of the inferiority of woman should ever have been seriously debated. For it is not without higher warrant than that of human reason, that I would claim for woman an equal place by the side of man. When in the beginning God created the heavens, the earth, the sea, and all that in them is, even as He then made laws for the stars and the seas, so did He then fix and determine forever the sphere and the destiny of man and of woman. Driven out of Paradise into the world on account of sin, neither man nor woman took their place at once; and in the nature of the case, woman's sphere was the last of the two to be understood. The Old Testament contains the germs of the great truths of all time; but over four thousand years were needed to prepare the human mind for the coming of Christ; and it was reserved for Christ fully to declare what place the Creator had designed for woman. I am fully persuaded that upon all great questions touching humanity, the human mind will at length accept the teachings of Christ as final; and the question whether or not woman is the equal of man, I conceive to be authoritatively settled by Him, when he pronounces marriage such a union as excludes the idea that there can be essential inferiority in one of the parties. His ideal of marriage, unknown alike to the classical nations and to the Hebrews, is incompatible with the inequality of the sexes. Nor do we find a trace in His life or teachings, or in those of His Apostles, which tends in the least to countenance such an idea. The few apparent exceptions to this statement grow out of Oriental usage, or are explained by the truth that subordination is consistent with equality. Not even superficial reasoners should have been misled by these exceptions, when, generally speaking, there is no distinction in the moral duties enjoined on each, none in the warnings and promises addressed to each, none at the cross, none in the day of judgment. Equality, though it excludes the idea of inferiority, is consistent with diversity. There is a difference between the sexes, that at once raises the question whether there should not be a difference in their education.