THE CONGRESS OE WOMEN.
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What is true of Jane Austen is also true of Mary Mitford. Both were notable women; both have helped in the education and the emancipation of the women of the nineteenth century. Let us add luster to what they have given us, and pass it on to the twentieth century.
What has the Quakeress of the eighteenth century done for the women of the nineteenth? Not even the great founder of the society could have reached so many needy women.
Elizabeth Fry had a special vocation for the office she undertook, and she is worthily called the mother of the philanthropic work of the nineteenth century. She had extreme opinions against capital punishment, yet it was these very extreme opinions that contributed largely to the change in the general tone of thought and feeling which resulted in a very marked abatement in our criminal code. How unspeakably wretched was the condition of women prisoners before the day of Elizabeth Fry! Surely, if the complete abandonment of self -to the well-being of a class, and that class the lowest and the most wicked, could render one worthy a crown, Elizabeth Fry wears a crown radiant with numberless stars. Yet she was bitterly opposed by men of learning and influence, simply because she turned aside from the common custom of women to do a great work for her sex.
Maria Edgeworth was another notable woman of the eighteenth century. She won the praise of great men in her own day, even of Sir Walter Scott and Lord Jeffries. The former admired her rich humor and her admirable tact in the delineation of her Irish characters, so much so that he was led to do the same work for his own people, and so came into existence the “Waverly Novels,” wholly suggested, as the author himself asserts and insists, by Maria Edgeworth. Lord Jeffries bestows upon her the highest praise when he speaks of her tales as works of more serious importance than much of the true history and solemn philosophy that comes daily under our inspection These notable women write with a high purpose in view, that of making all mankind better. Many of them were novelists, and it would seem that they outstripped the men in this department.
I can not pause to more than mention Mrs. Annie Radcliffe, whose works were translated into French and were very popular in France, as well as in England and in America. And Sarah Siddons, who transformed herself into the great creations of Shakespeare, and introduced “Lady Macbeth ” to the world. She made the dramatic profession worthy the best of women. Or Caroline Herschel, who brought great light into the world by the seven comets she discovered, without the aid of her brother, and won the gold medal of the Royal Astronomical Society. She opened for women the way to scientific study. Or Mary Somerville, who shows us the mechanism of the heavens, and makes the most abstruse subjects interesting to the most unscientific reader. Her life was an inspiration to our own Maria Mitchell, and to many another, no doubt, who never would have dreamed of the possibility of reaching such heights as have been gained but for the example of the women of the eighteenth century.
There is one other woman, it seems to me, whose history has never been fully written, who stands high above the rest in greatness. I speak of Hannah More. Indeed, if the appellation “notable” can be applied to any human being, history can furnish no name more truly deserving than hers. The greatness of the eighteenth century women culminates in Hannah More. The possibilities of the human soul and intellect are more strikingly manifested in her than in any other character that has ^appeared to us in centuries. She was the daughter of an humble schoolmaster, and yet by her own industry and merit she elevated herself to be the favored and caressed associate of all the distinguished in contemporary rank and literature. Her ambition to be of benefit to her generation was unbounded. Her benefactions were limited to no class and to no country. The influence of her writings will be felt for generations to come. During her own lifetime they effected a moral revolution, not only on the surface, but upon aristocrats and middle life. They were extensively influential in calming the passions and correcting the delusions of a misguided populace in times