“THE SUBJECTION OF WOMEN.”

White Ribbon, Volume 12, Issue 141, 13 February 1907, Page 1

“THE SUBJECTION OF WOMEN.”

Hy John Stuart Mill.

Among the many reprints given t<> the reading world during 190 f), possibly no other is so valuable to women as that of John Stuart Mill’s famous essay on “The Subjection c r Women. For many years it had been out of print and its reappearance in this cheap form (sixpence; ninepence in NX.) makes it a boon indeed. Added worth is given to the little book bv reason of the Analysis of the argument, which forms the principal part of the Introduction by the editor, Stanton Ooit. Ph. I). It was in 1809 that The Philosopher and Politician first published this most powerful contribution to the cause of woman’s freedom —a cause which lie had zealously advocated both in and out of Parliament. But though since then nearly forty yearshave passed and some improvement has been made in both the private and the public legal position of woman, there is still a vast field of law and custom to be broken up before woman can without let or hindrance fulfil her destiny. As a text book in the study of the fundamental principles underlying the Woman Movement, we strong-

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ly recommend this volume of a hundred and twenty odd pages. Unions and individual members should obtain, carefully read, and discuss it, and pass it on to men friends, husbands, sons and brothers. At drawing-room and other meetings it might be made a topic for papers and addressee Bv

such means would be hastened the coming of the day when in regard to opportunity of development of the individual and of Service to the Race there shall be “ neither male nor female.’ Clearly does the writer state the purpose of his essay: it is to explain

his opinion “That the legal sub ordination of one sex to the other it wrong in itself and now one of the chief hindrances to human improvement ; and that it ought to be replaced b}* a principle of perfect equality, admitting no power or privilege on the one side, nor disability on the other. Naturally, difficulty is experienced in defending this proposition because the objections to granting women equality Are Not Based on Argument but are rooted in the strongest feelings ; the difficulty is further rendered greater by reason of the fact that the subjection of woman is a well nigh universal usage. The authority of men over women is not the result of a conscientious comparison between different modes of constituting the government of society, but simply has its roots in the law of force. The partial banishine .t of that primitive law in the ancient republics, says Mr Mills, commenced the regeneration of human nature. The exceedingly slow growth and recognition of any higher law than that of force is evidenced by the fact that within forty years of the writing of the essay Englishmen might, by law, hold human beings in bondage as saleable property. The dominance of man over woman is a custom specially tenacious because the power is exercised not by a favoured few or privi-

Icged class, but by all men, from the clod-hopj>er to the nobleman. Of course the plea is often urged that Man's Lordship is Natural; but there was a time when the division of mankind into two classes, masters and slaves, appeared, even to the most cultivated minds, to he a natural, and the only natural, condition of the human race. Dealing with tlie assertion that women acquiesce in male sovereignty, the writer points out that all causes, social and natural, combine to make it unlikely that women should be collectively rebellious to the power of men. He also declares that “this re lie of the past is discordant with the future and must necessarily disappear. The peculiar characteristic of the modern world is that human heings arc no longer born to their place in life hut are free to employ their faculties to achieve the lot which to them appears desirable. “ Nobody thinks it necessary to make a law that only a strongarmed man shall be a blacksmith; freedom and competition bring about that result. “ In all things of difficulty and importance those who can do them well are fewer than the need and therefore “ if only once in a dozen years the conditions of eligibility exclude a fit person, there is a real loss.' At present, in the more improved countries, the disabilities of women form the only (save one Royalty) in which laws ami institutions Take Persons at their Birth and ordain that they shall never in all their lives be allowed to compete for certain things. Dealing with the assertion that tin* nature of men and women adapts them to their present functions and posit if n, Mr Mill denies that anyone knows or can know tin* nature of tin* two sexes as long as they have only been seen in thoir present relation to one another. “ What is now called the nature of woman is an eminently artificial thing, tin* result of forced repression in some directions, unnatural stimulation in others.” . . . “ The anxiety of mankind to interfere in behalf of nature, for fear lest nature should not succeed in effecting its purpose, is an altogether unnecessary solicitude. What women by nature cannot do it is quite superfluous to prevent them from doing.” Chapter 11. treats of the injustice and evil effects of legal inequality in mar-

riage. While not denying that there mav he great goodness, happiness, and affection under tin* ;>hs«*hiie government of a good man. it is pointed out that laws and customs require to be adapted not to good men but to bad. Men are not required, as a preliminary to the marriage ceremony, to prove by testimonial that they an* fit to be trusted with the exercise of absolute power. Combating the assertion that in all voluntary association between two people one of them must be absolute master, tin* writer asserts that Marriage should be a Partnership. 1 nder equality of rights men would be much more unselfish and -elf-sacri-ficing than at present. “ The equality of married persons before the law ... is the only means of rendering the daily life of mankind, in any high sense, a school of moral cultivation.” The only school of genuine moral sentiment is society between equals. The family, justly constituted, should lx*, on the part of the parents, a school of sympathy in equality of living together in love without power on one side or obedience on the other. The oft-quoted injunction of St. Paul to wives is, of course, commented on. “ The Church, it is very ti iu , enjoins it in her formularies, but it would be difficult to derive any such injunction from Christianity. . . . St. Paul also said, ‘ Slaves, obey your masters.’ It was not St. Paul's business, nor was it consistent with his object, the propagation of Christianity, to incite anyone to rebellion against existing laws.' “ Political functions and other opportunities favourable to intellectual originality are monopolised by men is tin* summary given of Chapter 111. by the editor. “The fitness of women for public* office, says Mr Mill, “ need not be discussed, since the system which excludes unfit men will exclude unfit women. ... If only a few women are lit Social Utility Requires that the door should not be shut on them.” The large proportion of eminent rulers among queens compared with the proportion of able men among kings is noted, and the assertion that under queens good men administrate is used as an argument that women are better qualified than men for the position of prime minister, seeing that the “ principal business of a prime

minister is . . . to find the fittest persons to conduct every department of public affairs. Ihe more rapid insight into character, which is one of the admitted points of superiority in women over men, must certainly make them, with anything like parity of qualifications in other respects, more apt than men in that choice of instruments which is nearly the most important business of everyone who has to do with governing mankind.” The statement as to woman’s intellectual inferiority to man is disputed, and the opinion expressed that before woman’s capacity with regard to the arts can be fully demonstrated many long years of mit ram moled opportunity must elapse. ‘I he complimentary ‘dictum about woman s superior moral goodness may lx* allowed to pair off with the disparagmg one respecting their greater liability to moral bias.” The last chapter deals with the query C ‘ tl “ It is hardly to be expected that the question will |, € asked in respect to the change proposed in the condition of women in marriage. There remain no legal slaves except the mistress of every house.” With ng.nd to the removal of women s disabilities and their recognition as the equals of men in all that belongs to citizenship, etc., emphasis is laid on the advantage of having “the most universal and pervading of all human relations regulated by justice instead of injustice." The Training in Arrogance g'iven to the Boy by the thought that, without merit of his own and by the very fact of his biith, he is entitled to command and woman to obey is pointed out. The essayist concludes by commenting on the benefit of doubling the mass of nx ntal faculties available for the higher service of humanity, the added stimulus tlx* intellect of man to he gained by woman’s competition, the increased happiness that would be felt by woman in the consciousness of her own power, and the enlarged ethical scope that < quality would afford for the exercise of woman’s influence.