The Woman Movement.

Hastings Standard, Issue 163, 4 November 1896, Page 4

The Woman Movement.

In a paper I>y Kdith Si .11!.- (irossman. M.A.. oil " l>rifts in tlit- \\ <llllllll MoV'-ini'iit," tin * writer says :—" In one si use we arc coming back to the old circle again ; only wv are 110 longer imprisoned in it ; we have an outlook 011 the world. We no longer train up our children for ourselves Li it for hiinifmitv. Our share 111 life is small, and yet 'it is a part of the infinite. But there is a different class from the reformers —the " revolti d.' They do not mean to accept painful conclusions. If Nature is against their desires they will light Nature, too. Love they will hnvc because it is a pleasant tiling, only it inust he as free as possible ; tliev are shocked at any talk of a ' marriji«_r,■ bond ' as if all moral obligations an- not. bonds, as if there could be all ' rights.' and pleasures, and libenies without duties and toil and endurance. Anything that requires patience they scornfully reject. I'he care of childhood is too troublesome f>r them. The watchword of the revolted whether wives, mothers, or daughters- -is • advance,' and they appear reckless what they are advancing into. The new thing is to them alwavs the true thiii.tr. They forget that many of the in.-titmions they would overthrow have their root in the inspirations of these gnat minds which appear (not so much in the old age of a nation), but rather at long intervals, in the history of the world. The revolted by no means include all 'new women.' for the new type appears in all but a small conservative section, but they are the noisest class. It is not ditlicult to predict their advance until they are distinguished from men chiefly by greater frivolity. The very worst of them - -the society new woman who smokes, shoots, hunts, and swears -we are thankful to sav ha - not yet reached New Zealand. Mav her day be long di.-talil ! Perhaps before then the counter revolution will have set in. l'or yet another fact history has taught. L\travagances are inevitably crushed by opposing extremes, and the only change that endures is the slow ami moderate growth that is in perfect agreement with the prevailing conditions of human nature."