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THE CONGRESS OE WOMEN.
This is another right which men look to women to preserve—the effort to renew society in the natural simplicity of our republican institutions. America has need of you, Kate. Man has need of you. We suffer for the need, as well as for the power, of loving and being loved. This is even greater in man than in woman, hence the chief reason why she almost always controls him. Man craves for the ideal, suffers for the want of it, but he dies not knowing how to get it. I say, Kate, that not even yet has womankind, in spite of her irrepressible longing to utter the clear, free, elevated speech, that shall yet stir the pulses of the world. I can not better tell you what I believe is needed than to close with the words of that true American woman:
“ ‘ If thou wouldst have happiness, choose neither fame, which doth not long abide, nor power, which stings the hand that wields it; nor gold, which glitters, but never glorifies; but choose thou love, and hold it forever in thy heart of hearts; for love is the purest and the mightiest force in the universe, and once it is thine, all other gifts shall be added unto thee. Eove that is passionate, yet reverent, gentle, yet strong, selfish in desiring all, yet generous in giving all, love of man for woman, of woman for man, of parent for child, of friend for friend—when this is born in the soul the desert blossoms of the rose; straightway new wishes, hopes, sweet longings and pure ambitions spring into being like green shoots that lift their tender heads in sunny places, and if the soil be kind they grow stronger and more beautiful as each glad day laughs in the rosy sky.’ ”
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