at an early day exercise the right of voting. New Jersey also specifically secured this right to women on the 2d of July, 1776—a right exercised by them for more than a third of a century. Thus our country started into governmental life freighted with the protests of the Revolutionary Mothers against being ruled without their consent. From that hour to the present, women have been continually raising their voices against political tyranny, and demanding for themselves equality of opportunity in every department of life.
In 1790, Mary Wollstonecraft's "Vindication of the Rights of Women," published in London, attracted much attention from liberal minds. She examined the position of woman in the light of existing civilizations, and demanded for her the widest opportunities of education, industry, political knowledge, and the right of representation. Although her work is filled with maxims of the highest morality and purest wisdom, it called forth such violent abuse, that her husband appealed for her from the judgment of her contemporaries to that of mankind. So exalted were her ideas of woman, so comprehensive her view of life, that Margaret Fuller, in referring to her, said: "Mary Wollstonecraft—a woman whose existence proved the need of some new interpretation of woman's rights, belonging to that class who by birth find themselves in places so narrow that, by breaking bonds, they become outlaws." Following her, came Jane Marcet, Eliza Lynn, and Harriet Martineau—each of whom in the early part of the nineteenth century, exerted a decided influence upon the political thought of England. Mrs. Marcet was one of the most scientific and highly cultivated persons of the age. Her "Conversations on Chemistry," familiarized that science both in England and America, and from it various male writers filched their ideas. It was a text-book in this country for many years. Over one hundred and sixty thousand copies were sold, though the fact that this work emanated from the brain of a woman was carefully withheld. Mrs. Marcet also wrote upon political economy, and was the first person who made the subject comprehensive to the popular mind. Her manner of treating it was so clear and vivid, that the public, to whom it had been a hidden science, were able to grasp the subject. Her writings were the inspiration of Harriet Martineau, who followed her in the same department of thought at a later period. Miss Martineau was a remarkable woman. Besides her numerous books on political economy, she was a regular contributor to the London Daily News, the second paper in circulation in England, for many years writing five long articles weekly, also to Dickens' Household Words, and the Westminster Review. She saw clearly the spirit and purpose of the Anti-Slavery Movement in this country, and was a regular contributor to the National Anti-Slavery Standard, published in New York. Eliza Lynn, an Irish lady, was at this time writing leading editorials for political papers. In Russia, Catharine II., the absolute and irresponsible ruler of that vast nation, gave utterance to views, of which, says La Harpe, the revolutionists of France and America fondly thought themselves the originators. She caused her grandchildren to be educated into the most liberal ideas, and Russia was at one time the only country in Europe where political refugees could find safety. To Catharine, Russia is indebted for the first proposition to enfranchise the serfs, but meeting strong opposition she was obliged to relinquish this idea, which was carried to fruition by her great-grandson, Alexander.
This period of the eighteenth century was famous for the executions of women on account of their radical political opinions, Madame Roland, the leader of the liberal party in France, going to the guillotine with the now famous words upon her lips, "Oh, Liberty, what crimes are committed in thy name!" The beautiful Charlotte Corday sealed with her life her belief in liberty, while Sophia Lapiérre barely escaped the same fate; though two men, Siéyes and Condorcét, in the midst of the French Revolution, proposed the recognition of woman's political rights.
Frances Wright, a person of extraordinary powers of mind, born in Dundee, Scotland, in 1797, was the first woman who gave lectures on political subjects in America. When sixteen years of age she heard of the existence of a country in which freedom for the people had been proclaimed; she was filled with joy and a determination to visit the American Republic where the foundations of justice, liberty, and equality had been so securely laid. In 1820 she came here, traveling extensively North and South. She was at that time but twenty-two years of age. Her letters gave Europeans the first true knowledge of America, and secured for her the friendship of Lafayette. Upon her second visit she made this country her home for several years. Her radical ideas on theology, slavery, and the social degradation of woman, now generally accepted by the best minds of the age, were then denounced by both press and pulpit, and maintained by her at the risk of her life. Although the Government of the United States was framed on the basis of entire separation of Church and State, yet from an early day the theological spirit had striven to unite the two, in order to strengthen the Church by its union with the civil power. As early as 1828, the standard of "The Christian Party in Politics" was openly unfurled. Frances Wright had long been aware of its insidious efforts, and its reliance upon women for its support. Ignorant, superstitious, devout, woman's general lack of education made her a fitting instrument for the work of thus undermining the republic. Having deprived her of her just rights, the country was new to find in woman its most dangerous foe. Frances Wright lectured that winter in the large cities of the West and Middle States, striving to rouse the nation to the new danger which threatened it. The clergy at once became her most bitter opponents. The cry of "infidel" was started on every side, though her work was of vital importance to the country and undertaken from the purest philanthropy. In speaking of her persecutions she said: "The injury and inconvenience of every kind and every hour to which, in these days, a really consistent reformer stands exposed, none can conceive but those who experience them. Such become, as it were, excommunicated after the fashion of the old Catholic Mother Church, removed even from the protection of law, such as it is, and from the sympathy of society, for whose sake they consent to be crucified."
Among those who were advocating the higher education of women, Mrs. Emma Willard became noted at this period. Born with a strong desire for learning, she keenly felt the educational disadvantages of her sex. She began teaching at an early day, introducing new studies and new methods in her school, striving to secure public interest in promoting woman's education. Governor Clinton, of New York, impressed with the wisdom of her plans, invited her to move her school from Connecticut to New York. She accepted, and in 1819 established a school in Watervleit, which soon moved to Troy, and in time built up a great reputation. Through the influence of Governor Clinton, the Legislature granted a portion of the educational fund to endow this institution, which was the first instance in the United States of Government aid for the education of women. Amos B. Eaton, Professor of the Natural Sciences in the Rensselaer Institute, Troy, at this time, was Mrs. Willard's faithful friend and teacher. In the early days it was her custom, in introducing a new branch of learning into her seminary, to study it herself, reciting to Professor Eaton every evening the lesson of the next day. Thus she went through botany, chemistry, mineralogy, astronomy, and the higher mathematics. As she could not afford teachers for these branches, with faithful study she fitted herself. Mrs. Willard's was the first girls' school in which the higher mathematics formed part of the course, but such was the prejudice against a liberal education for woman, that the first public examination of a girl in geometry (1829) created as bitter a storm of ridicule as has since assailed women who have entered the law, the pulpit, or the medical profession. The derision attendant upon the experiment of advancing woman's education, led Governor Clinton to say in his message to the Legislature: "I trust you will not be deterred by commonplace ridicule from extending your munificence to this meritorious institution." At a school convention in Syracuse, 1845, Mrs. Willard suggested the employment of woman as superintendents of public schools, a measure since adopted in many States. She also projected the system of normal schools for the higher education of teachers. A scientific explorer as well as student, she wrote a work on the "Motive Power in the Circulation of the Blood," in contradiction to Harvey's theory, which at once attracted the attention of medical men. This work was one of the then accumulating evidences of woman's adaptation to medical study.
In Ancient Egypt the medical profession was in the hands of women, to which we may attribute that country's almost entire exemption from infantile diseases, a fact which recent discoveries fully authenticate. The enormous death-rate of young children in modern civilized countries may be traced to woman's general enforced ignorance of the laws of life, and to the fact that the profession of medicine has been too exclusively
