THE WOMEN'S FRANCHISE.

Evening Star, Issue 7252, 1 July 1887, Page 4

THE WOMEN'S FRANCHISE.

to tub editor. Sir,—l have read with feelings of shame and sorrow the unmanly letter of your correspondent " A Student of Divinity." From such divinity as his may Heaven defend us. Had he s'.udied that which is comprehensible he would probably have learnt the truth, that those who are held in subjection are thereby kept in a condition which unfits them to be free. If the assertion that " woman is naturally infeiior to man " were true there might be some excuse for the tone of his letter; but the evidence is all on the other side. On every hand we see women taking a leading position in literature, in science, and in art. In acts of heroism and devotion to duty woman is quits equal, if not superior, to man. I have lived a tolerably long life, and can speak as one who has had muoh experience. Turn to the biographies of the moat distinguished men, who have won for themselves a plaC9 on the scroll ot fame, and the majority ot tbem owe much oi their greatness to the influencs ot good and noble mothers.

' II the majority of women in the middle and working classes of the day are ignorant of their political rights and duties, it is because such obstructionists as "A Student in Divinity" have too long had the power to bold them in bondage. The teaching of the early Christian Church, however well it may have suited the semi-barbarism of the age, is worse than useless in the civilisation of to-day. The tide of progress is flowing, and all the male disciples of Mrs Partington will not be able to sweep it back. Give our wives, sisters, and mothers their rights, and they will as a body rise to their true responsibilities. Keep them in such bondage as " A Student of Divinity" appears by his quotations to approve of, and they will only be fit to be the mothers of slaves or "to suoklo fools and chronicle small beer."—l am, etc., A Student of Humanity, Dunedin, June 28.