Derby Technical College. 
 
THE 
 
 WILLIAM R. PERKINS 
 LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 DUKE UNIVERSITY 
 
 Rare Books 
 
Digitized by the Internet Archive 
 in 2014 
 
 https://archive.org/details/ofqueensgardensOOrusk 
 
OF QUEENS' GARDENS. 
 BY JOHN RUSKIN 
 
t 
 
-BE THOU GLAD, OH THIRSTING 
 DESERT j LET THE DESERT BE 
 MADE CHEERFUL, AND BLOOM 
 AS THE LILY > AND THE BAR- 
 REN PLACES OF JORDAN SHALL 
 RUN WILD WITH WOOD.'-ISAIAH 
 XXXV. 1 (SEPTUAGINT) V 
 
OF QUEENS^GARDENS 
 
 fT will, perhaps, be 
 well, as this Lec^j 
 ture is the sequeh 
 of one previously 
 given, that I should 
 shortly state to youj 
 my general inten* 
 ition in both. The 
 questions specially j 
 proposed to you in^ 
 f the first, namely, How and What to Read, 
 rose out of a far deeper one, which it was myl 
 ^endeavour to make you propose earnestly to 
 yourselves, namely, WHY to Read* I want 
 you to feel, with me, that whatever advan* 
 tages we possess in the present day in thel 
 ►diffusion of education and of literature, can* 
 only be rightly used by any of us when we 
 ►have apprehended clearly what education is' 
 to lead to, and literature to teach. I wish youl 
 to see that both well-directed moral training' 
 land well'chosen reading lead to the posses* 
 Ision of a power over the ilkguided and illiter* 
 |)|/ ate, which is, according to the measure of it,! 
 
 in the truest sense, KINGLY; conferring in< 
 ^/deed the purest kingship that can exist amongi 
 
 m 
 
men: too many other kingships (however \mr/Vfi\]]i 
 distinguished by visible insignia or material Wmj Will 
 power) being either spectral, or tyrannous ; — \vt/^ 
 spectral — that is to say, aspects and shadowsf^C^ 
 only of royalty, hollow as death, and which 
 only the "likeness of a kingly crown have 
 on " : or else — tyrannous — that is to say, sub- 
 stituting their own will for the law of justice 
 and love by which all true kings rule* 
 
 HERE is, then, I repeat — and 
 as I want to leave this idea 
 with you, I begin with it, and/ 
 shall end with it — only one' 
 pure kind of kingship; an 
 inevitable and eternal kind,^ 
 crowned or not ; the kingship, namely, which 
 [consists in a stronger moral state, and a truer 
 thoughtful state, than that of others ; enabling 
 you, therefore, to guide, or to raise them. 
 Observe that word 44 State "; we have got 
 k into a loose way of using it. It means liter 
 (ally the standing and stability of a thing ; and 
 you have the full force of it in the derived 
 word " statue " — 44 the immovable thing." A 
 king's majesty or 44 state," then, and the right 
 'of his kingdom to be called a state, depends 
 on the movelessness of both : — without tre^ 
 .mor, without quiver of balance; established^ 
 
 m 
 
MM 
 
 and enthroned upon a foundation of eternal | 
 law which nothing can alter, nor overthrow, 
 ELIEVING that all literature 
 and all education are only use^j 
 ful so far as they tend to con* 
 firm this calm, beneficent, and 
 THEREFORE kingly, power, 
 — first, over ourselves, and, 
 through ourselves, over all around us, — I ami 
 now going to ask you to consider with me far* 
 ther, what special portion or kind of this royaL 
 authority, arising out of noble education, may, 
 rightly be possessed by women ; and how far 
 they also are called to a true queenly power ,( 
 not in their households merely, but over all 
 within their sphere. And in what sense, if 
 they rightly understood & exercised this royal] 
 or gracious influence, the order and beauty in* 
 duced by such benignant power would justify^ 
 us in speaking of the territories over which 
 ach of them reigned, as " Queens' Gardens/ 
 ND here, in the very outset, wel 
 are met by a far deeper question/ 
 which — strange though this 
 may seem — remains among] 
 many of us yet quite undeci* 
 ded in spite of its infinite im> 
 portance. €EWe cannot determine what thei 
 
 m 
 m 
 
I queenly power of women should be, until we I 
 are agreed what their ordinary power should 
 be. We cannot consider how education may 
 fit them for any widely extending duty, until l^sg: 
 we are agreed what is their true constant v-S^ 
 duty. And there never was a time when wilder 
 words were spoken, or more vain imagina^ 
 tion permitted, respecting this question — quite 
 'vital to all social happiness. The relations 
 of the womanly to the manly nature, their 
 ^different capacities of intellect or of virtue, 
 seem never to have been yet estimated with 
 entire consent. We hear of the "mission" 
 •and of the 44 rights " of Woman, as if these 
 could ever be separate from the mission and 
 the rights of Man — as if she and her lord were 
 [creatures of independent kind, and of irrecon* 
 cilable claim. This, at least, is wrong. And 
 'not less wrong — perhaps even more foolishly 
 wrong (for I will anticipate thus far what I 
 k hope to prove) — is the idea that woman is 
 'only the shadow and attendant image of her JjjjjfrXt. 
 lord, owing him a thoughtless and scrv ^ e /^Pffj 
 >obedience, and supported altogether in her™ 
 weakness by the pre-eminence of his forti' 
 ftude. fCThis, I say, is the most foolish of 
 all errors respecting her who was made to be 
 ihe helpmate of man. As if he could be helped 
 
 m 
 
effectively by a shadow, or worthily by a slave ! j 
 ET us try, then, whether we 
 cannot get at some clear and 
 harmonious idea (it must bel 
 harmonious if it is true) oft 
 what womanly mind and virtue 
 are in power and office, with 
 respect to man's; and how their relations, 
 rightly accepted, aid and increase the vigour! 
 and honour and authority of both. €EAnd 
 now I must repeat one thing I said in the/ 
 last lecture : namely, that the first use of edu* 
 cation was to enable us to consult with the 
 wisest and the greatest men on all points oii 
 earnest difficulty. That to use books rightly, 
 was to go to them for help : to appeal to them, 
 when our own knowledge & power of thought j 
 failed : to be led by them into wider sight,- 
 purer conception, — than our own, and receive 1 
 from them the united sentence of the judges 
 and councils of all time, against our solitary ( 
 and unstable opinion. €C Let us do this now. 
 Let us see whether the greatest, the wisest,' 
 the purest'hearted of all ages are agreed in 
 any wise on this point : let us hear the tes* 
 timony they have left respecting what theyi 
 held to be the true dignity of woman, and 
 ^her mode of help to man. 
 
iND first let us take Shake* 
 speare* €E Note broadly in the 
 outset, Shakespeare has no 
 heroes ; — he has only heroines* 
 There is not one entirely heroic 
 figure in all his plays, except 
 the slight sketch of Henry the Fifth, exag* 
 gerated for the purposes of the stage ; and the 
 'still slighter Valentine in The Two Gentle* 
 men of Verona* In his laboured and perfect 
 .plays you have no hero* Othello would have 
 been one, if his simplicity had not been so 
 great as to leave him the prey of every base 
 ^practice round him ; but he is the only ex* 
 ample even approximating to the heroic type* 
 Coriolanus — Caesar — Antony stand in flawed 
 [Strength, and fall by their vanities ; — Hamlet 
 is indolent, and drowsily speculative ; Romeo 
 an impatient boy; the Merchant of Venice 
 languidly submissive to adverse fortune; 
 'Kent, in King Lear, is entirely noble at heart, 
 'but too rough & unpolished to be of true use 
 at the critical time, and he sinks into the office 
 of a servant only* Orlando, no less noble, 
 is yet the despairing toy of chance, followed, 
 'comforted, saved by Rosalind. Whereas 
 there is hardly a play that has not a perfect 
 
 i woman 
 
 steadfast 
 
errorless purpose : Cordelia, Desdemona, Isa* 
 bella, Hermione, Imogen, Queen Catherine^ 
 Perdita, Sylvia, Viola, Rosalind, Helena, and 
 last, and perhaps loveliest, Virgilia, are alii 
 ^faultless; conceived in the highest heroic^ 
 type of humanity. 
 
 HEN observe, secondly, fEThej 
 catastrophe of every play is 
 caused always by the folly or| 
 fault of a man ; the redemption, 
 if there be any, is by the wis* 
 dom and virtue of a woman,, 
 and, failing that, there is none. The catas* 
 
 trophe of King Lear is owing to his own( 
 iwant of judgment, his impatient vanity, his 
 misunderstanding of his children ; the virtue 
 of his one true daughter would have saved! 
 'him from all the injuries of the others, unless! 
 ,he had cast her away from him ; as it is, she! 
 all but saves him. €E Of Othello I need not 
 rtrace the tale ; — nor the one weakness of his' 
 so mighty love; nor the inferiority of his! 
 perceptive intellect to that even of the second 1 
 nwoman character in the play, the Emilia who, 
 [dies in wild testimony against his error : — 
 
 II/ " Oh, murderous coxcomb ! what should 
 such a fool 
 Do with so good a wife ? 99 
 
|€E In Romeo and Juliet , the wise and brave 
 stratagem of the wife is brought to ruinous 
 issue by the reckless impatience of her hus^ 
 |band. In Winter's Tale, and in Cymbeline, 
 >the happiness and existence of two princely 
 households, lost through long years, and 
 imperilled to the death by the folly and obsti* 
 Inacy of the husbands, are redeemed at last 
 'by the queenly patience and wisdom of the 
 wives* In Measure for Measure, the foul hv 
 justice of the judge, and the foul cowardice 
 ,of the brother, are opposed to the victorious 
 truth and adamantine purity of a woman. In 
 loriolanus, the mother's counsel, acted upon 
 in time, would have saved her son from all 
 evil ; his momentary forgetfulness of it is his 
 iruin ; her prayer, at last granted, saves him 
 -not, indeed, from death, but from the curse 
 W living as the destroyer of his country. 
 fEAnd what shall I say of Julia, constant 
 against the fickleness of a lover who is a 
 (mere wicked child ? — of Helena, against the 
 petulance and insult of a careless youth ? — of 
 the patience of Hero, the passion of Beatrice, 
 and the calmly devoted wisdom of the "un^ 
 'lessoned girl/' who appears among the help< 
 lessness, the blindness, and the vindictive 
 passions of men, as a gentle angel, bringing 
 
courage and safety by her presence, and de< 
 f eating the worst malignities of crime by what 
 women are fancied most to fail in, — precision 
 
 r^^/and accuracy of thought ♦ 
 
 further, among aft 
 the principal figures in Shaken 
 speare's plays, there is onlyi 
 one weak woman — Ophelia; 
 and it is because she fails' 
 Hamlet at the critical moment, 
 and is not, and cannot in her nature be,( 
 a guide to him when he needs her most,j 
 that all the bitter catastrophe follows* Fin* 
 ally, though there are three wicked women' 
 among the principal figures — Lady Macbeth, 
 Regan, and Goneril — they are felt at once to 
 be frightful exceptions to the ordinary laws] 
 of life; fatal in their influence also, in pro* 
 portion to the power for good which they^ 
 have abandoned. €E Such, in broad light, is { 
 Shakespeare's testimony to the position and, 
 character of women in human life. He re^; 
 presents them as infallibly faithful and wise 
 counsellors, — incorruptibly just and pure, 
 examples — strong always to sanctify, even| 
 |/when they cannot save. 
 
OT as in any wise comparable 
 in knowledge of the nature of vu 
 man, — still less in his under^\Wy* 
 standing of the causes and(p^f^ 
 courses of fate, — but only as^^ 
 the writer who has given us 
 the broadest view of the conditions and modes 
 | of ordinary thought in modern society, I ask 
 you next to receive the witness of Walter 
 Scott €E I put aside his merely romantic prose 
 (Writings as of no value, and though the early 
 romantic poetry is very beautiful, its testis 
 mony is of no weight, other than that of a 
 ►boy's ideal. But his true works, studied from 
 Scottish life, bear a true witness ; and in the 
 whole range of these, there are but three men 
 who reach the heroic type, See Appendix, 
 Note A. J* — Dandie Dinmont, Rob Roy, 
 and Claverhouse; of these, one is a border 
 farmer; another a freebooter; the third a 
 soldier in a bad cause. And these touch the 
 'ideal of heroism only in their courage and 
 faith, together with a strong, but uncultivated, ll/ffifik 
 or mistakenly applied, intellectual power; 
 while his younger men are the gentlemanly 
 [playthings of fantastic fortune, and only by 
 aid (or accident) of that fortune, survive, not 
 vanquish, the trials they involuntarily sustain. 
 
Of any disciplined, or consistent character,! 
 » earnest in a purpose wisely conceived, or 
 *\sxy<* dealing with forms of hostile evil, definitely 
 T^j^challenged anc * resolutely subdued, there isj 
 no trace in his conceptions of young men^ 
 
 a 
 
 * k 
 
 young 
 
 Whereas in his imaginations of women, — in 
 the characters of Ellen Douglas, of Flora 
 Maclvor, Rose Bradwardine, Catherine Sey- 
 ton, Diana Vernon, Lilias Redgauntlet, Alice! 
 Bridgenorth, Alice Lee, and Jeanie Deans,- 
 with endless varieties of grace, tenderness, andj 
 ^Vyi,jintellectual power, we find in all a quite in^ i 
 ^^^rfallible sense of dignity and justice ; a fearless, 
 instant, and untiring self-sacrifice, to even thd 
 appearance of duty, much more to its real 
 claims; and, finally, a patient wisdom of 
 deeply^restrained affection, which does in- 
 finitely more than protect its objects from a| 
 momentary error; it gradually forms, ani- 
 mates, and exalts the characters of the un- 
 worthy lovers, until, at the close of the tale/ 
 we are just able, and no more, to take patience! 
 in hearing of their unmerited success. 9L So 
 that, in all cases, with Scott as with Shake- 
 speare, it is the woman who watches over,j 
 M teaches, and guides the youth; it is never,] 
 Lby any chance, the youth who watches over, 
 0or educates, his mistress. 
 
EXT take,though more briefly, 
 graver testimony — that of the 
 great Italians and Greeks* You 
 know well the plan of Dante's l^^Ss 
 great poem — that it is a love^^ 
 poem to his dead lady ; a song 
 [of praise for her watch over his soul. Stoop* 
 ing only to pity, never to love, she yet saves 
 him from destruction — saves him from hell* 
 He is going eternally astray in despair ; she 
 (comes down from heaven to his help, and 
 ^throughout the ascents of Paradise is hisi 
 teacher, interpreting for him the most diffi^ 
 'cult truths, divine and human ; and leading 
 him, with rebuke upon rebuke, from star to^ 
 star* €E I do not insist upon Dante's concept 
 ition; if I began I could not cease: besides,! 
 you might think this a wild imagination of 
 one poet's heart. So I will rather read to< 
 you a few verses of the deliberate writing of 
 a knight of Pisa to his living lady, wholly 
 [characteristic of the feeling of all the noblest rm 
 men of the thirteenth, or early fourteenth, Un^^ 
 century, preserved among many other suchi 
 records of knightly honour and love, which! 
 'Dante Rossetti has gathered for us from 
 among the early Italian poets. 
 
 \3&- \9&- 3& 
 
44 For lo ! thy law is passed 
 That this my love should manifestly be 
 
 To serve and honour thee : 
 And so I do ; and my delight is full, 
 Accepted for the servant of thy rule* 
 
 Without almost, I am all rapturous, 
 
 Since thus my will was set 
 To serve, thou flower of joy, thine excel* 
 lence : 
 
 Nor ever seems it anything could rouse 
 
 A pain or a regret* 
 But on thee dwells my every thought and 1 
 sense ; 
 
 Considering that from thee all virtues spread , 
 
 As from a fountain head, — 
 THAT IN THY GIFT IS WISDOM'S 
 BEST AVAIL 
 AND HONOUR WITHOUT FAIL,i 
 With whom each sovereign good dwells | 
 separate, 
 
 Fulfilling the perfection of thy state* 
 
 " Lady, since I conceived 
 Thy pleasurable aspect in my heart, 
 
 MY LIFE HAS BEEN APART 
 IN SHINING BRIGHTNESS AND 
 THE PLACE OF TRUTH ; 
 Which till that time, good sooth, 
 Groped among shadows in a darkened place, 
 Where many hours and days 
 
It hardly ever had remembered good* 
 
 But now my servitude 
 Is thine, and I am full of joy and rest 
 
 A man from a wild beast 
 Thou madest me, since for thy love I lived/' 
 
 [OU may think perhaps a Greek 
 knight would have had a lower 
 estimate of women than this 
 Christian lover. His spiritual 
 subjection to them was indeed 
 i not so absolute ; but as regards 
 ^their own personal character, it was only be* 
 cause you could not have followed me so 
 ^easily, that I did not take the Greek women 
 instead of Shakespeare's; and instance, fori 
 chief ideal types of human beauty and faith, j 
 [the simple mother's and wife's heart of Andro* 
 mache; the divine, yet rejected wisdom of 1 
 Cassandra; the playful kindness and simple" 
 princesS'life of happy Nausicaa; the house* 
 wifely calm of that of Penelope, with its watch 1 
 'upon the sea ; the ever patient, fearless, hope' /M 
 lessly devoted piety of the sister, and daughter, Ijfj^^ 
 in Antigone; the bowing down of Iphigenia,f ' 
 lamb4ike and silent ; and finally, the expecta^l 
 ftion of the resurrection, made clear to the soul 
 of the Greeks in the return from her grave of. 
 [that Alcestis, who, to save her husband, hadl^ 
 
 8p 
 
passed calmly through the bitterness of death, 
 OW I could multiply witness 1 
 upon witness of this kind upon 
 you if I had time, I wouldj 
 take Chaucer, and show you< 
 why he wrote a Legend of 
 Good Women ; but no Legend 
 of Good Men* I would take Spenser, and] 
 show you how all his fairy knights are some* 
 times deceived and sometimes vanquished ; 
 but the soul of Una is never darkened, and< 
 the spear of Britomart is never broken. Nay, 
 I could go back into the mythical teaching oJ 
 the most ancient times, and show you howl 
 the great people, — by one of whose princesses 
 it was appointed that the Lawgiver of all 
 the earth should be educated, rather than byj 
 his own kindred ; — how that great Egyptian 
 people, wisest then of nations, gave to their 
 Spirit of Wisdom the form of a Woman ; and 
 into her hand, for a symbol, the weaver's' 
 shuttle ; and how the name and the form of! 
 that spirit, adopted, believed, and obeyed by' 
 the Greeks, became that Athena of the olive* 
 helm, and cloudy shield, to faith in whomj 
 you owe, down to this date, whatever youj 
 hold most precious in art, in literature, or in 
 types of national virtue. 
 
)UT I will not wander into this 
 distant and mythical element; 
 I will only ask you to give its 
 legitimate value to the testis 
 mony of these great poets and 
 men of the world, — consistent, 
 as you see it is, on this head, I will ask you 
 whether it can be supposed that these men, in 
 'the main work of their lives, are amusing 
 themselves with a fictitious and idle view of 
 [the relations between man and woman ; — nay, 
 I worse than fictitious or idle ; for a thing may 
 be imaginary, yet desirable, if it were possible ? 
 'but this, their ideal of woman, is, according 
 to our common idea of the marriage relation, 
 wholly undesirable* The woman, we say, is 
 [not to guide, nor even to think for herself* 
 The man is always to be the wiser ; he is to 
 be the thinker, the ruler, the superior in know* 
 ledge and discretion, as in power* 
 
 ~~*>S it not somewhat important 
 to make up our minds on this 
 matter? Are all these great 
 men mistaken, or are we ? 
 Are Shakespeare and ^schy* 
 lus, Dante and Homer, merely 
 dressing dolls for us ; or, worse than dolls, 
 unnatural visions, {he realization of which, 
 
'were it possible, would bring anarchy into all) 
 households and ruin into all affections? Nay, 
 if you can suppose this, take lastly the evi* 
 y dence of facts, given by the human heart itself, 
 y In all Christian ages which have been remark* 
 able for their purity or progress, there has been 
 absolute yielding of obedient devotion, by the 
 lover, to his mistress* I say OBEDIENT ; 
 — not merely enthusiastic and worshipping 
 in imagination, but entirely subject, receiving 
 from the beloved woman, however young, 
 not only the encouragement, the praise, and 
 the reward of all toil, but, so far as any choice 
 is open, or any question difficult of decision, 
 the DIRECTION of all toil That chivalry, 
 to the abuse and dishonour of which are attri* 
 butable primarily whatever is cruel in war, 
 unjust in peace, or corrupt and ignoble inj 
 domestic relations ; and to the original purity 
 and power of which we owe the defence alike 
 of faith, of law, and of love ; that chivalry, I 
 say, in its very first conception of honour* 
 able life, assumes the subjection of the young 
 knight to the command — should it even be 
 the command in caprice — of his lady. It as- 
 sumes this, because its masters knew that 
 the first and necessary impulse of every truly 
 taught and knightly heart is this of blind 
 
I service to its lady: that where that true faith' 
 and captivity are not, all wayward and wicked 
 passion must be ; and that in this rapturous 
 (obedience to the single love of his youth, is^|^| 
 >the sanctification of all man's strength, and * 
 the continuance of all his purposes* And this,i 
 not because such obedience would be safe, or 
 [honourable, were it ever rendered to the un*L 
 'worthy ; but because it ought to be impossible^ 
 for every noble youth — it IS impossible for 
 |every one rightly trained — to love any one 
 i whose gentle counsel he cannot trust,or whosej 
 prayerful command he can hesitate to obey* 
 DO not insist by any farther 
 argument on this, for I think it 4 
 should commend itself at oncel 
 to your knowledge of what has] 
 been and to your feeling of 
 what should be* You cannot" 
 think that the buckling on of the knight's 
 armour by his lady's hand was a mere caprio 
 'of romantic fashion* It is the type of an eternal 
 truth — that the soul's armour is never well set 
 to the heart unless a woman's hand has braced 
 it ; and it is only when she braces it loosely 
 'that the honour of manhood fails* Know you 
 not those lovely lines — I would they were 
 learned by all youthful ladies of England: — vs 
 
 m 
 
[Iffrri^ffll " Ah, wasteful woman ! — she who may 
 Hjjll Jjjjy On her sweet self set her own price, 
 
 Knowing he cannot choose but pay — 
 ^kjgjj How has she cheapened Paradise ! 
 
 Vlif How 
 
 given for nought her priceless gift, 
 How spoiled the bread and spill'd the wine, 
 Which, spent with due respective thrift, 
 Had made brutes men, and men divine ! 99 
 See Appendix, Note B. j+\ 
 
 |HUS much, then, respecting the 
 relations of lovers I believe you| 
 will accept. But what we too, 
 often doubt is the fitness of the 
 continuance of such a relation' 
 throughout thewhole of human 
 llife. We think it right in the lover and mis*- 
 [tress, not in the husband and wife. That is toj 
 say, we think that a reverent and tender duty 
 4s due to one whose affection we still doubt, 
 and whose char icter we as yet do but partially 
 k and distantly discern ; and that this reverence i 
 and duty are to be withdrawn when the affec- 
 tion has become wholly and limitlessly our 
 own, and the character has been so sifted and, 
 tried that we fear not to entrust it with the 
 happiness of our lives. Do you not see how! 
 .ignoble this is, as well as how unreasonable ? 
 ^yy ^Do you not f eel that marria ge, — w hen it is 
 
(marriage at all, — is only the seal which marks 
 the vowed transition of temporary into un* 
 tiring service, and of fitful into eternal love ? 
 ^^^^j^^^jUT how, you will ask, is the 
 idea of this guiding function of 
 the woman reconcilable with a 
 true wifely subjection ? Simply 
 in that it is a GUIDING, not 
 a determining, function. Let me 
 try to show you briefly how these powers 
 i seem to be rightly distinguishable* €E We are 
 foolish, and without excuse foolish, in speaks 
 ing of the "superiority" of one sex to the 
 Mother, as if they could be compared in similar 
 things* Each has what the other has not: 
 each completes the other, and is completed by 
 ithe other : they are in nothing alike, and the 
 happiness and perfection of both depends on 
 each asking and receiving from the other what 
 the other only can give* 
 
 |OW their separate characters 
 are briefly these. The man's 
 power is active, progressive, 
 defensive* He is eminently the i 
 doer, the creator, the discoverer, i 
 the defender. His intellect is 
 for speculation and invention ; his energy for 
 i adventure, for war, and for conquest, wherever 
 
war is just, wherever conquest necessary. 
 But the woman's power is for rule, not for 
 battle, — and her intellect is not for invention 
 or creation, but for sweet ordering, arrange- 
 ment, and decision. She sees the qualities* 
 of things, their claims, and their places. Her 
 great function is Praise; she enters into no, 
 contest, but infallibly adjudges the crown of j 
 contest. By her office, and place, she is pro- 
 tected from all danger and temptation. The 
 man, in his rough work in open world, must- 
 encounter all peril and trial ; — to him, therefore,^ 
 must be the failure, the offence, the inevitable 
 error : often he must be wounded, or subdued ;! 
 often misled ; and ALWAYS hardened. But 
 he guards the woman from all this ; within 
 his house, as ruled by her, unless she herself] 
 has sought it, need enter no danger, no temp* 
 tation, no cause of error or offence. This^ 
 is the true nature of home — it is the place of i 
 Peace ; the shelter, not only from all injury, 
 but from all terror, doubt, and division. In! 
 so far as it is not this, it is not home ; so far' 
 as the anxieties of the outer life penetrate into 
 it, and the inconsistently-minded, unknown, 
 unloved, or hostile society of the outer world' 
 is allowed by either husband or wife to cross 
 the threshold, it ceases to be home ; it is then/ 
 
only a part of that outer world which YOu\w/?j<Tm 
 have roofed over, and lighted fire in* But so W j Jjjlj 
 far as it is a sacred place, a vestal temple, a*W/j 
 temple of the hearth watched over by House<(^^ 
 hold Gods, before whose faces none may come y^^^| 
 but those whom they can receive with love, — A4=5§^ 
 so far as it is this, and roof and fire are types 
 only of a nobler shade and light, — shade as 
 of the rock in a weary land, and light as of 
 the Pharos in the stormy sea ; — so far it vin* 
 dicates the name, and fulfils the praise, of 
 Home, €EAnd wherever a true wife comes, 
 this home is always round hen The stars 
 only may be over her head; the glowworm 
 in the night'Cold grass may be the only fire 
 at her foot ; but home is yet wherever she is ; 
 and for a noble woman it stretches far round 
 her, better than ceiled with cedar, or painted 
 with vermilion, shedding its quiet light far, 
 for those who else were homeless. 
 
 HIS, then, I believe to be, — will 
 you not admit it to be, — the 
 woman's true place and power? Ifjjffij^m 
 But do not you see that, to fuk 
 fil this, she must — as far as one 
 can use such terms of a human 
 creature — be incapable of error ? So far as 
 she rules, all must be right, or nothing is. She 
 
must be enduringly, incorruptibly good; in- 
 stinctively, infallibly wise — wise, not for self* 
 development, but for self-renunciation : wise, 
 not that she may set herself above her hus- 
 band, but that she may never fail from hisi 
 side : wise, not with the narrowness of inso* 
 [lent and loveless pride, but with the pas* 
 sionate gentleness of an infinitely variable,! 
 (because infinitely applicable, modesty of ser* 
 vice — the true changefulness of woman. In 
 that great sense — " La donna e mobile," not ( 
 i" Qual pidm' al vento " ; no, nor yet " Vari^ 
 able as the shade, by the light quivering 
 aspen made"; but variable as the LIGHT,! 
 ^anifold in fair and serene division, that it 
 imay take the colour of all that it falls upon, 
 land exalt it. 
 
 HAVE been trying, thus far, tol 
 show you what should be the' 
 place, and what the power of 
 woman. Now, secondly, we 
 ask, What kind of education' 
 is to fit her for these? IE And 
 | if you indeed think this a true conception 
 lof her office and dignity, it will not be diffi-j 
 cult to trace the course of education which' 
 would fit her for the one, and raise her to the 
 'other. 9L The first of our duties to her — no. 
 
[thoughtful persons now doubt this, — is to 
 secure for her such physical training and ex- 
 ercise as may confirm her health, and perfect 
 |her beauty; the highest refinement of that 
 'beauty being unattainable without splendour 
 of activity and of delicate strength* To per- 
 fect her beauty, I say, and increase its power ; 
 tt cannot be too powerful, nor shed its sacred 
 'light too far : only remember that all physi- 
 cal freedom is vain to produce beauty with- 
 out a corresponding freedom of heart. There 
 t are two passages of that poet who is dis- 
 tinguished, it seems to me, from all others 
 ■not by power, but by exquisite RIGHT- 
 NESS — which point you to the source, and 
 describe to you, in a few syllables, the com- 
 pletion of womanly beauty. I will read the 
 introductory stanzas, but the last is the one I 
 'wish you specially to notice : — 
 
 44 Three years she grew in sun and shower 
 Then Nature said, 4 A lovelier flower 
 
 4 On earth was never sown ; 
 4 This child I to myself will take ; 
 4 She shall be mine, and I will make 
 4 A lady of my own. 
 
 44 4 Myself will to my darling be 
 4 Both law and impulse ; and with me 
 4 The girl, in rock and plain, 
 
4 In earth and heaven, in glade and bower, 
 4 Shall feel an overseeing power 
 4 To kindle, or restrain. 
 
 ^^^) 44 4 The floating clouds their state shall lend 
 )J%1%^( 4 To her, for her the willow bend ; 
 
 4 Nor shall she fail to see, 
 ' Even in the motions of the storm, 
 4 Grace that shall mould the maiden's form] 
 4 By silent sympathy. 
 
 " 4 And VITAL FEELINGS OF DELIGHT 
 4 Shall rear her form to stately height, — 
 
 4 Her virgin bosom swell. 
 4 Such thoughts to Lucy I will give, 
 4 While she and I together live, 
 4 Here in this happy dell/ 99 
 
 is* See Appendix, Note C. 
 
 C 44 VITAL feelings of delight/' observe. 
 There are deadly feelings of delight ; but th( 
 natural ones are vital, necessary to very life, 
 €E And they must be feelings of delight, if 
 ithey are to be vital. Do not think you can, 
 make a girl lovely, if you do not make herf 
 jii^^SX happy. There is not one restraint you put' 
 on a good girl's nature — there is not one, 
 check you give to her instincts of affectioi 
 or of effort — which will not be indelibly writ 
 ten on her features, with a hardness which 
 ^jis all the more painful because it takes awayi 
 
 i, 
 
I the brightness from the eyes of innocence, and 
 the charm from the brow of virtue. 
 
 HIS for the means: now note 
 the end. Take from the same 
 poet, in two lines, a perfect de* 
 scription of womanly beauty — 
 44 A countenance in which did 
 meet 
 
 Sweet records, promises as sweet" 
 €E The perfect loveliness of a woman's coun* 
 tenance can only consist in that majestic peace, 
 which is founded in the memory of happy 
 and useful years, — full of sweet records ; and 
 from the joining of this with that yet more 
 majestic childishness, which is still full of, 
 change & promise ; — opening always — mod' 
 est at once, and bright, with hope of better 
 (things to be won, and to be bestowed. There 
 is no old age where there is still that promise. 
 
 HUS, then, you have first to 
 mould her physical frame, and 
 then, as the strength she gains 
 will permit you, to fill and tenv 
 per her mind with all know* 
 ledge and thoughts which tend 
 'to confirm its natural instincts of justice, an dl|(| 
 refine its natural tact of love. €EA11 such, 
 .knowledge should be given her as may enable 
 
her to understand, and even to aid, the work 
 of men : and yet it should be given, not as 
 knowledge, — not as if it were, or could be, for 
 OE^^jher an object to know ; but only to feel, and| 
 )i^l^C to judge. It is of no moment, as a mattei 
 of pride or perfectness in herself, whether she 
 knows many languages or one; but it is of j 
 the utmost, that she should be able to show 
 kindness to a stranger, and to understand the' 
 sweetness of a stranger's tongue. It is of no 
 moment to her own worth or dignity that shej 
 should be acquainted with this science or that 
 but it is of the highest that she should be 
 trained in habits of accurate thought; that! 
 she should understand the meaning, the inevi- 
 tableness, and the loveliness of natural laws ; 
 and follow at least some one path of scientific] 
 attainment, as far as to the threshold of that 
 bitter Valley of Humiliation, into which only' 
 the wisest and bravest of men can descend, 
 wning themselves for ever children, gathering , 
 pebbles on a boundless shore. It is of little! 
 consequence how many positions of cities she' 
 knows, or how many dates of events, or names , 
 of celebrated persons — it is not the object ol 
 education to turn the woman into a dictionary;! 
 but it is deeply necessary that she should be 
 ^/taught to enter with her whole personality into/ 
 
[the history she reads ; to picture the passages 1 
 of it vitally in her own bright imagination ; to 
 apprehend, with her fine instincts, the pathetic 
 circumstances and dramatic relations, which k^^a 
 rthe historian too often only eclipses by his 
 reasoning, and disconnects by his arrange* 
 ment : it is for her to trace the hidden equities 
 I of divine reward, and catch sight, through 
 the darkness, of the fateful threads of woven 
 fire that connect error with retribution* But, 
 jChiefly of all, she is to be taught to extend 
 the limits of her sympathy with respect to 
 that history which is being for ever determined 
 fas the moments pass in which she draws her 
 peaceful breath; and to the contemporary 
 calamity, which, were it but rightly mourned 
 by her, would recur no more hereafter. She 
 is to exercise herself in imagining what would 
 be the effects upon her mind and conduct, if 
 she were daily brought into the presence of 
 'the suffering which is not the less real because 
 'shut from her sight* She is to be taught 
 somewhat to understand the nothingness of 
 the proportion which that little world in which 
 jshe lives & loves, bears to the world in which 
 iGod lives and loves; — and solemnly she is 
 to be taught to strive that her thoughts of 
 .piety may not be feeble in proportion to the^ 
 
which they must indeed beware how they pro* 
 fanely touch — that of theology. Strange, and 
 k miserably strange, that while they are modest 
 enough to doubt their powers, and pause at 
 the threshold of sciences where every step is 
 demonstrable and sure, they will plunge head* 
 long, and without one thought of incom- 
 petency, into that science in which the great- 
 est men have trembled, and the wisest erred. 
 Strange, that they will complacently and pride- 
 fully bind up whatever vice or folly there is in 
 
to recommend themselves to their Master, by' 
 crawling up the steps of His judgmentohrone 
 to divide it with Him, Strangest of all that 
 i they should think they were led by the Spirit l^sS 
 'of the Comforter into habits of mind which 
 have become in them the unmixed elements 
 of home discomfort; and that they dare to 
 turn the Household Gods of Christianity into 
 'ugly idols of their own ; — spiritual dolls, for 
 them to dress according to their caprice ; and 
 (from which their husbands must turn away 
 ^in grieved contempt, lest they should be 
 shrieked at for breaking them, 
 
 BELIEVE, then, with this ex- 
 ception, that a girl's education 
 .should be nearly, in its course 
 and material of study, the same 
 as a boy's ; but quite differently 
 directed. A woman, in any 
 rank of life, ought to know whatever her 
 'husband is likely to know, but to know it in 
 'a different way. His command of it should m 
 be foundational & progressive ; hers, general 
 and accomplished for daily and helpful use. 
 Not but that it would often be wiser in men to 
 'learn things in a womanly sort of way, for pre* 
 sent use, and to seek for the discipline & train- 
 ing of their mental powers in such branches 
 
 m 
 
[of study as will be afterwards fittest for social | 
 service ; but, speaking broadly, a man ought 
 to know any language or science he learns, 
 g£g?Jthoroughly — while a woman ought to know 
 the same language, or science, only so far as< 
 may enable her to sympathise in her husband's 
 pleasures, and in those of his best friends. 
 
 ET, observe, with exquisite ac- 
 curacy as far as she reaches J 
 There is a wide difference be* 
 tween elementary knowledge| 
 and superficial knowledge — be- 
 tween a firm beginning, and an 
 infirm attempt at compassing. A woman' 
 may always help her husband by what she 
 knows, however little; by what she half- 
 knows, or mis'knows, she will only teasei 
 him. €E And indeed, if there were to be any 
 difference between a girl's education and a 
 boy's, I should say that of the two the girl 
 should be earlier led, as her intellect ripens 4 
 faster, into deep and serious subjects : and that' 
 her range of literature should be, not more, but 
 less frivolous ; calculated to add the qualities 
 of patience and seriousness to her natural! 
 poignancy of thought and quickness of wit ;l 
 and also to keep her in a lofty and pure ele* 
 ^jment of thought. I enter not now into any! 
 
I question of choice of books ; only let us be 
 sure that her books are not heaped up in her 
 lap as they fall out of the package of the cfrv 
 (culating library, wet with the last and lightesti^^fi 
 rspray of the fountain of folly. 
 
 R even of the fountain of wit ; 
 for with respect to the sore 
 temptation of novel reading, it 
 is not the badness of a novel 
 that we should dread, so much 
 as its overwrought interest. 
 The weakest romance is not so stupefying 
 as the lower forms of religious exciting lite* 
 Mature, and the worst romance is not so cor* 
 rupting as false history, false philosophy, or 
 false political essays. But the best romance 
 ibecomes dangerous, if, by its excitement, it 
 renders the ordinary course of life uninterest' 
 ing, and increases the morbid thirst for useless 
 acquaintance with scenes in which we shall 
 never be called upon to act. 
 
 SPEAK therefore of good 
 novels only; and our modern 
 literature is particularly rich in 
 i types of such. Well read, in* 
 deed, these books have serious 
 use, being nothing less than 
 , treatises on moral anatomy and chemistry;^ 
 
studies of human nature in the elements of it.| 
 But I attach little weight to this function : they 
 are hardly ever read with earnestness enough 
 j^gjto permit them to fulfil it. The utmost theyj 
 usually do is to enlarge somewhat the charityi 
 of a kind reader, or the bitterness of a mali' 
 cious one ; for each will gather, from the novel, 
 vjfood for her own disposition. Those who 
 are naturally proud and envious will learn! 
 from Thackeray to despise humanity ; those 
 who are naturally gentle, to pity it ; those whoj 
 are naturally shallow, to laugh at it. So, also,, 
 there might be a serviceable power in novels 
 to bring before us, in vividness, a human! 
 truth which we had before dimly conceived ; 
 but the temptation to picturesqueness of state* 
 ment is so great, that often the best writersl 
 of fiction cannot resist it ; and our views are 
 rendered so violent and one-sided, that their 
 vitality is rather a harm than good. 
 
 ITHOUT, however, venturing' 
 here on any attempt at deci* 
 sion how much novel reading' 
 should be allowed, let me at 
 least clearly assert this, — thatj 
 whether novels, or poetry, or| 
 history be read, they should be chosen, not 
 for their freedom from evil, but for their] 
 
I possession of good The chance and scattered 
 evil that may here and there haunt, or hide 
 itself in, a powerful book, never does any harm 
 (to a noble girl ; but the emptiness of an author 
 'oppresses her, and his amiable folly degrades 
 her* And if she can have access to a good 
 library of old and classical books, there need 
 |be no choosing at all* Keep the modern 
 magazine and novel out of your girl's way : 
 turn her loose into the old library every wet 
 |day, and let her alone* She will find what 
 L is good for her ; you cannot : for there is just 
 this difference between the making of a girl's 
 Character and a boy's — you may chisel a boy 
 into shape, as you would a rock, or hammer 
 him into it, if he be of a better kind, as you 
 [would a piece of bronze* But you cannot 
 hammer a girl into anything* She grows as 
 a flower does, — she will wither without sun ; 
 she will decay in her sheath, as a narcissus 
 [will, if you do not give her air enough ; she 
 'may fall, and defile her head in dust, if you 
 leave her without help at some moments of 
 .her life ; but you cannot fetter her ; she must 
 Itake her own fair form and way, if she take 
 [any, &, in mind as in body, must have always 
 44 Her household motions light and free 
 And steps of virgin liberty*" 
 
 m 
 
Let her loose in the library, I say, as you del 
 a fawn in a field. It knows the bad weeds 
 twenty times better than you ; and the good 
 K^j^ones too, and will eat some bitter and prickly 
 ^^ones, good for it, which you had not the slight- 
 est thought would have been so. 
 
 EN, in art, keep the finest! 
 models before her, and let her 
 practice in all accomplishments^ 
 be accurate and thorough, so 
 as to enable her to understand) 
 more than she accomplishes. 
 say the finest models — that is to say, the truest, 
 simplest, usefullest. Note those epithets : the] 
 will range through all the arts. Try them in 
 music, where you might think them the least 
 applicable. I say the truest, that in which] 
 the notes most closely and faithfully express! 
 the meaning of the words, or the character ov 
 intended emotion ; again, the simplest, that 
 in which the meaning and melody are at' 
 tained with the fewest and most significant' 
 notes possible ; and, finally, the usefullest/ 
 that music which makes the best words most 
 beautiful, which enchants them in our memo- 
 ries each with its own glory of sound, and! 
 which applies them closest to the heart at the 
 ^moment we need them. 
 
ND not only in the material! 
 and in the course, but yet more 
 earnestly in the spirit of it, 
 let a girl's education be as seri'ljs^Sj 
 ous as a boy's* You bring V» 
 up your girls as if they werej 
 meant for sideboard ornaments, and then 
 complain of their frivolity. Give them the 
 same advantages that you give their brothers 
 — appeal to the same grand instincts of vir* 
 tue in them ; teach THEM, also, that cour- 
 age and truth are the pillars of their being :j 
 — do you think that they would not answer' 
 that appeal, brave and true as they are even 
 now, when you know that there is hardly a* 
 girls' school in this Christian kingdom where 
 the children's courage or sincerity would be 
 thought of half so much importance as their 
 way of coming in at a door ; and when the< 
 whole system of society, as respects the mode 
 of establishing them in life, is one rotten* 
 plague of cowardice and imposture — cow-* m 
 ardice, in not daring to let them live, or ///^^ 
 love, except as their neighbours choose; andr 
 imposture, in bringing, for the purposes of | 
 our own pride, the full glow of the world's 
 worst vanity upon a girl's eyes, at the 
 very period when the whole happiness of! 
 
 m. 
 
her future existence depends upon her re* 
 maining undazzled? 
 
 ND give them, lastly, not only- 
 noble teachings, but noble 
 teachers. You consider some- 
 what before you send your boy 
 to school, what kind of a man 
 the master is ; — whatsoever 
 kind of a man he is, you at least give him 
 full authority over your son, and show some 
 respect to him yourself ; — if he comes to dine 
 with you, you do not put him at a side table : 
 you know also that, at college, your child's 
 immediate tutor will be under the direction of 
 some still higher tutor, for whom you have 
 absolute reverence. You do not treat the Dean 
 of Christ Church or the Master of Trinity as 
 your inferiors. IE But what teachers do you 
 give your girls, and what reverence do you 
 show to the teachers you have chosen ? Is 
 a girl likely to think her own conduct, or her 
 own intellect, of much importance, when you 
 trust the entire formation of her character, 
 moral and intellectual, to a person whom you 
 let your servants treat with less respect than 
 they do your housekeeper (as if the soul o 
 your child were a less charge than jams and 
 groceries), and whom you yourself think you 
 
(confer an honour upon by letting her some^iK^rjjjijj 
 times sit in the drawing-room in the evening ? W[| will 
 [^^^JgHUS, then, of literature as her »| i 
 help, and thus of art. There is^^^ 
 one more help which she cannot 
 do without — one which, alone, 
 has sometimes done more than 
 Jail other influences besides, — 
 the help of wild and fair nature. Hear this 
 of the education of Joan of Arc : — €E 44 The 
 education of this poor girl was mean, accord' 
 ing to the present standard ; was ineffably, 
 grand, according to a purer philosophic stand 
 ard ; & only not good for our age, because for 
 us it would be unattainable. * * * €E Next 
 after her spiritual advantages, she owed most 
 to the advantages of her situation. The foun^ 
 tain of Domr^my was on the brink of a bound' 
 less forest ; and it was haunted to that degree 
 by fairies, that the parish priest (cur£) was 
 obliged to read mass there once a year, im 
 order to keep them in decent bounds. ^ 
 CBut the forests of Domr^my — those werc /j/*P^ 
 the glories of the land; for in them abode™ 
 mysterious powers and ancient secrets that 
 towered into tragic strength. Abbeys there 
 were, and abbey windows, — Mike Moorish 
 temples of the Hindoos/ that exercised even^ 
 
princely power both in Touraine and in the 
 German Diets, These had their sweet bells 
 that pierced the forests for many a league at 
 ^matins or vespers, and each its own dreamy! 
 legend. Few enough, and scattered enough/ 
 were these abbeys, so as in no degree to dis- 
 turb the deep solitude of the region ; yet many 1 
 enough to spread a network or awning of 
 Christian sanctity over what else might have' 
 seemed a heathen wilderness." ^ See Ap< 
 pendix, Note D. J* €E Now, you cannot, in* 
 deed, have here in England, woods eighteen^ 
 miles deep to the centre ; but you can, perhaps,, 
 keep a fairy or two for your children yet, il 
 you wish to keep them. But DO you wish 
 it ? Suppose you had each, at the back of 
 your houses, a garden, large enough for your] 
 children to play in, with just as much lawnl 
 as would give them room to run, — no more — 
 and that you could not change your abode ; 
 but that, if you chose, you could double your 
 income, or quadruple it, by digging a coal shaft] 
 in the middle of the lawn, and turning the 
 flower-beds into heaps of coke. Would you j 
 do it ? I hope not. I can tell you, you would 
 be wrong if you did, though it gave you in-' 
 come sixty-fold instead of four-fold. 
 
 tMP 1 i& 
 
 m 
 
ET this is what you are doing 
 with all England. The whole 
 country is but a little garden, 
 not more than enough for your 
 children to run on the lawns 
 ^ of, if you would let them ALL 
 run there* And this little garden you will 
 turn into furnace ground, and fill with heaps 
 of cinders, if you can ; and those children of 
 yours, not you, will suffer for it. For the 
 fairies will not be all banished ; there are fairies 
 of the furnace as of the wood, and their first 
 gifts seem to be 44 sharp arrows of the mighty 99 ; 
 but their last gifts are 44 coals of juniper/' 
 
 ND yet I cannot — though there 
 is no part of my subject that 
 I feel more — press this upon 
 you ; for we made so little use 
 of the power of nature while 
 we had it that we shall hardly 
 feel what we have lost. Just on the other 
 side of the Mersey you have your Snowdon, 
 and your Menai Straits, & that mighty granite 
 rock beyond the moors of Anglesea, splendid 
 n its heathery crest, and foot planted in the 
 eep sea, once thought of as sacred — a divine 
 promontory, looking westward; the Holy 
 Head or Headland, still not without awe when 
 
its red light glares first through storm* Thesel 
 are the hills, and these the bays and blue in* 
 lets, which, among the Greeks, would have 
 . been always loved, always fateful in influencej 
 on the national mind. That Snowdon is youi 
 Parnassus ; but where are its Muses ? That 
 Holyhead mountain is your Island of JEgina; 
 but where is its Temple to Minerva ? 
 
 HALL I read you what the! 
 Christian Minerva had achieved 
 under the shadow of our Par^ 
 nassus up to the year 1848 ? — i 
 Here is a little account of a 
 Welsh school, from page 261 1 
 of the Report on Wales, published by the 
 Committee of Council on Education. This 
 is a school close to a town containing 5,000] 
 persons : — €E"I then called up a larger class, 
 most of whom had recently come to the' 
 school. Three girls repeatedly declared they 
 had never heard of Christ, and two that' 
 they had never heard of God. Two out ofl 
 six thought Christ was on earth now " (they' 
 might have had a worse thought perhaps), 
 " three knew nothing about the Crucifixion. 
 Four out of seven did not know the names! 
 of the months nor the number of days in 
 g/a year. They had no notion of addition! 
 
beyond two and two, or three and three; 
 their minds were perfect blanks/' €E Oh 
 women of England! from the Princess 
 that Wales to the simplest of you, do not{||^ 
 think your own children can be brought 
 into their true fold of rest, while these are 
 scattered on the hills, as sheep having no 
 shepherd. And do not think your daughters 
 can be trained to the truth of their own human 
 beauty, while the pleasant places, which God 
 made at once for their schoolroom and their 
 playground, lie desolate and defiled. You can* 
 not baptize them rightly in those inch^deep 
 fonts of yours, unless you baptize them also 
 in the sweet waters which the great Lawgiver 
 strikes forth for ever from the rocks of your 
 native land — waters which a Pagan would 
 have worshipped in their purity, and you 
 worship only with pollution* You cannot 
 lead your children faithfully to those narrow 
 axe'hewn church altars of yours, while the 
 dark azure altars in heaven — the mountains IM 
 that sustain your island throne,- — mountains I 
 on which a Pagan would have seen the powers 
 
 [of heaven rest in every wreathed cloud — re* 
 for you without inscription; altars 
 
 mam 
 
 built, not to, but by an Unknown God. 
 
HUS far, then, of the nature,! 
 thus far of the teaching, of' 
 woman, and thus of her house* 
 hold office, and queenliness.| 
 We now come to our last,< 
 our widest question. — What 
 is her queenly office with respect to the 1 
 state ? •£ Generally, we are under an im< 
 pression that a man's duties are public, and! 
 a woman's private. But this is not alto' 
 gether so. A man has a personal work, 
 or duty, relating to his own home, and a, l 
 public work or duty, which is the expan- 
 sion of the other, relating to the state. Sol 
 a woman has a personal work or duty, re<* 
 lating to her own home, and a public work 
 or duty, which is also the expansion of that, 
 •E Now the man's work for his own homel 
 is, as has been said, to secure its mainte* 
 nance, progress, and defence; the woman's 
 to secure its order, comfort, and loveliness.' 
 €E Expand both these functions. The man's! 
 duty as a member of a commonwealth, is to 4 
 assist in the maintenance, in the advance, 
 in the defence of the state. The woman's 
 )|/duty, as a member of the commonwealth,' 
 ^is to assist in the ordering, in the comfort 
 ,gying, and in the beautiful adornment of thei 
 
state* 9L What the man is at his own g at ^W#7)fll] 
 defending it, if need be, against insult and \MlwJjb 
 spoil, that also, not in a less, but in a more 
 devoted measure, he is to be at the gate 
 'of his country, leaving his home, if need 
 be, even to the spoiler, to do his more 
 incumbent work there* €E And, in like man* 
 iner, what the woman is to be within her 
 'gates, as the centre of order, the balm of dis* 
 tress, and the mirror of beauty : that she is 
 i also to be without her gates, where order 
 is more difficult, distress more imminent, 
 loveliness more rare* fEAnd as within the 
 ^human heart there is always set an instinct 
 for all its real duties, — an instinct which you 
 cannot quench, but only warp and corrupt 
 I if you withdraw it from its true purpose: 
 -as there is the intense instinct of love, 
 f which, rightly disciplined, maintains all the 
 sanctities of life, and, misdirected, undermines 
 ^them; and MUST do either the one or the 
 [other; — so there is in the human heart an m 
 inextinguishable instinct, the love of P ower '//||p| 
 which* rightly directed* maintains all t ^ e (^^3s 
 majesty of law and life, and, misdirected/ 
 'wrecks them. 
 
EEP rooted in the innermost) 
 life of the heart of man, and of 
 the heart of woman, God set 
 it there, and God keeps it therej 
 — Vainly, as falsely, you blamei 
 or rebuke the desire of power ! 
 For Heaven's sake, and for Man's sake, 
 desire it all you can. But WHAT power ?J 
 That is all the question. Power to destroy ?! 
 the lion's limb, and the dragon's breath ? Not 
 so. Power to heal, to redeem, to guide, and- 
 to guard. Power of the sceptre and shield;, 
 the power of the royal hand that heals in 
 touching, — that binds the fiend, and looses the! 
 captive; the throne that is founded on the 
 rock of Justice, and descended from only by 
 steps of Mercy. Will you not covet such] 
 power as this, and seek such throne as this,| 
 and be nojnore housewives, but queens ? 
 
 T is now long since the women 
 of England arrogated, univer* 
 sally, a title which once be-! 
 longed to nobility only; and,' 
 having once been in the habit of 
 acceptingthe simple title of gen* 
 tlewoman as correspondent to that of gentle-! 
 man, insisted on the privilege of assuming the 
 'title of 44 Lady," jt See Appendix, Note E. , 
 
 m. 
 
which properly corresponds only to the title of 
 44 Lord/' CI do not blame them for this ; but 
 only for their narrow motive in this* I would 
 have them desire and claim the title of Lady,iw* 
 provided they claim, not merely the title, ^ut^^^Xj 
 the office and duty signified by it. Lady means 
 44 bread'giver"or 44 loakgiver," andLord means ^ 
 44 maintainer of laws/' & both titles have refer* 
 lence, not to the law which is maintained in the 
 house, nor to the bread which is given to the 
 household ; but to law maintained for the mul* 
 titude,& to bread broken among the multitude* 
 So that a Lord has legal claim only to his title 
 fin so far as he is the maintainer of the justice of 
 the Lord of lords ; & a Lady has legal claim to 
 her title only so far as she communicates that 
 help to the poor representatives of her Master, 
 which women once, ministering to Him of 
 'their substance, were permitted to extend to 
 that Master Himself ; and when she is known, 
 'as He Himself once was, in breaking of bread. 
 
 1ND this beneficent and legal 
 dominion, this power of the 
 Dominus, or House^Lord, and 
 of the Domina,or House^Lady, 
 is great and venerable, not in 
 the number of those through 
 whom it has lineally descended, but in the 
 
 m 
 
[number of those whom it grasps within its) 
 sway; it is always regarded with reverent 
 worship wherever its dynasty is founded on 
 lits duty, and its ambition correlative with its) 
 beneficence* Your fancy is pleased with th( 
 , thought of being noble ladies, with a train of 
 I vassals. Be it so ; you cannot be too noble, I 
 ^Jand your train cannot be too great ; but see 
 Jiv/fto it that your train is of vassals whom you! 
 serve and feed, not merely of slaves who serve 
 and feed YOU ; and that the multitude whichj 
 lobeys you is of those whom you have conv 
 'forted, not oppressed, — whom you have re* 
 deemed, not led into captivity. 
 
 fD this, which is true of the 
 lower or household dominion, 
 is equally true of the queenly] 
 dominion ; that highest dignity 
 is open to you, if you will also' 
 accept that highest duty. Rex 
 >et Regina— Roi et Reine— 44 RIGHT-doers " ;' 
 they differ but from the Lady and Lord, in! 
 that their power is supreme over the mind as 
 lover the person — that they not only feed and 
 I clothe, but direct and teach. And whether 
 consciously or not, you must be, in many al 
 ,heart, enthroned : there is no putting by that 
 0 crown; queens you must always be: queens < 
 
|to your lovers ; queens to your husbands and 
 your sons ; queens of higher mystery to the 
 world beyond, which bows itself, and will for 
 (ever bow, before the myrtle crown and theijg^s 
 ^stainless sceptre of womanhood. But, alas! 
 you are too often idle and careless queens, 
 grasping at majesty in the least things, while 
 jyou abdicate it in the greatest; and leaving 
 'misrule and violence to work their will among 
 men, in defiance of the power which, holding 
 (Straight in gift from the Prince of all Peace, the 
 i wicked among you betray, and the good forget. 
 
 IRINCE of Peace/' Note that 
 name. When kings rule in 
 that name, and nobles, and the 
 judges of the earth, they also, 
 in their narrow place, and 
 mortal measure, receive the 
 'power of it. There are no other rulers than 
 they ; other rule than theirs is but MISrule ; 
 they who govern verily 44 Dei Gratia 99 are all 
 'princes, yes, or princesses of Peace. There 
 'is not a war in the world, no, nor an injustice, /$|f^ 
 L but you women are answerable for it ; not in 1 
 that you have provoked, but in that you have 
 [not hindered. Men, by their nature, are prone 
 to fight ; they will fight for any cause, or for 
 ^none. It is for you to choose their cause for\s 
 
 S3?-' 
 
[them, and to forbid them when there is noj 
 cause* There is no suffering, no injustice,' 
 no misery, in the earth, but the guilt of it lies 
 gijwith you. Men can bear the sight of it, buti 
 £z you should not be able to bear it. Men may< 
 tread it down without sympathy in their own 
 struggle; but men are feeble in sympathy, 
 and contracted in hope ; it is you only whol 
 can feel the depths of pain, and conceive thej 
 way of its healing. Instead of trying to do 
 this, you turn away from it ; you shut your- 
 selves within your park walls and garden] 
 gates; and you are content to know that 
 there is beyond them a whole world in wiU 
 derness — a world of secrets which you dare 
 not penetrate; and of suffering which you 
 dare not conceive. 
 
 TELL you that this is to m« 
 quite the most amazing among) 
 the phenomena of humanity. 
 I am surprised at no depths to, 
 which, when once warped from! 
 its honour, that humanity can 
 be degraded. I do not wonder at the miser's 
 [death, with his hands, as they relax, dropping 
 gold. I do not wonder at the sensualist's life,| 
 with the shroud wrapped about his feet. I do 
 not wonder at the single-handed murder of a- 
 
single victim, done by the assassin in the dark 
 
 ness of the railway, or reed shadow of ^\((\(Jfli 
 marsh. I do not even wonder at the myriad' 
 handed murder of multitudes, done boastfully (^s^e 
 'in the daylight, by the frenzy of nations, and 
 the immeasurable, unimaginable guilt, heaped 
 up from hell to heaven, of their priests, 
 land kings. But this is wonderful to me — oh, 
 'how wonderful ! — to see the tender and deli- 
 cate woman among you, with her child at her 
 (breast, and a power, if she would wield it, 
 over it, and over its father, purer than the air 
 of heaven, and stronger than the seas of earth 
 •nay, a magnitude of blessing which her hus- 
 band would not part with for all that earth 
 itself, though it were made of one entire and 
 [perfect chrysolite: — to see her abdicate this 
 majesty to play at precedence with her next- 
 'door neighbour! This is wonderful — oh, 
 wonderful! — to see her, with every innocent 
 Reeling fresh within her, go out in the morn- 
 ling into her garden to play with the fringes 
 of its guarded flowers, and lift their heads 
 when they are drooping, with her happy smile 
 upon her face, and no cloud upon her brow, 
 'because there is a little wall around her place 
 of peace: and yet she knows, in her heart, 
 k if she would only look for its knowledge,^ 
 
that, outside of that little rose<covered wall, 
 the wild grass, to the horizon, is torn up by' 
 the agony of men, and beat level by the drift 
 of their life-blood* 
 
 AVE you ever considered what, 
 a deep under meaning there lies, 
 or at least may be read, if we^ 
 choose, in our custom of strew' 
 ing flowers before those whom] 
 we think most happy? Do 
 you suppose it is merely to deceive them, 
 into the hope that happiness is always to fall 
 thus in showers at their feet ? — that wherever 
 they pass they will tread on herbs of sweet) 
 scent, and that the rough ground will be made 
 smooth for them by depths of roses? So 
 surely as they believe that, they will have,] 
 instead, to walk on bitter herbs and thorns ;| 
 and the only softness to their feet will be' 
 of snow. But it is not thus intended they 
 should believe; there is a better meaning in 4 
 that old custom. The path of a good woman! 
 is indeed strewn with flowers ; but they rise' 
 behind her steps, not before them. 44 Her 
 feet have touched the meadows, and left the] 
 daisies rosy," 
 
 l^f* i& i£P 
 
OU think that only a lover's 
 fancy ; — false and vain ! How 
 if it could be true ? You think 
 this also, perhaps, only a poet's 
 fancy — 
 
 " Even the light harebell raised 
 its head 
 Elastic from her airy tread/' 
 
 'But it is little to say of a woman, that she 
 only does not destroy where she passes. She 
 ishould revive; the harebells should bloom, 
 ,not stoop, as she passes. You think I am 
 rushing into wild hyperbole ! Pardon me, not 
 'a whit — I mean what I say in calm English, 
 spoken in resolute truth. You have heard it 
 said — (and I believe there is more than fancy 
 [even in that saying, but let it pass for a fan* 
 ciful one) — that flowers only flourish rightly 
 in the garden of some one who loves them. 
 I know you would like that to be true ; you 
 .would think it a pleasant magic if you could 
 'flush your flowers into brighter bloom by a /M 
 kind look upon them : nay, more, if your ^ 00 ^lfr^^M 
 k had the power, not only to cheer, but to guard > J/Sp^f 
 
 — if you could bid the black blight turn away, 
 'and the knotted caterpillar spare — if you could U| 
 bid the dew fall upon them in the drought, JM 
 iand say to the south wind, in frost — "Come,l^ 
 
thou south, and breathe upon my garden, that 
 the spices of it may flow out" This you 
 would think a great thing? And do you think 
 it not a greater thing, that all this, (and howj 
 much more than this I) you CAN do, for fairei 
 flowers than these — flowers that could bless 
 you for having blessed them, and will love 
 you for having loved them ; flowers that havej 
 thoughts like yours, and lives like yours 
 and which, once saved, you save for ever? 
 Is this only a little power ? Far among thej 
 moorlands and the rocks, — far in the darkness i 
 of the terrible streets, — these feeble florets are 
 lying, with all their fresh leaves torn, andl 
 their stems broken : will you never go down 
 to them, nor set them in order in their little 
 fragrant beds, nor fence them in their trem^j 
 bling, from the fierce wind ? Shall morning 
 follow morning, for you, but not for them;' 
 and the dawn rise to watch, far away, those 
 frantic Dances of Death ; jt See 4 Of Kings'' 
 Treasuries/ Appendix, Note J. J* but no' 
 dawn rise to breathe upon these living banks 
 of wild violet, and woodbine, and rose ; nor 
 call to you, through your casement — call (not 
 giving you the name of the English poet's! 
 lady, but the name of Dante's great Matilda, 
 who, on the edge of happy Lethe, stood,j 
 
wreathing flowers with flowers), saying : — 
 " Come into the garden, Maud, 
 For the black bat, night, has flown, 
 And the woodbine spices are wafted abroad, 
 And the musk of the roses blown 99 ? 
 
 CWill you not go down among them? — 
 among those sweet living things, whose new 
 courage, sprung from the earth with the deep 
 colour of heaven upon it, is starting up in 
 strength of goodly spire ; and whose purity, 
 iwashed from the dust, is opening, bud by 
 t bud, into the flower of promise; — and still 
 they turn to you, and for you, 44 The Lark* 
 'spur listens— I hear, I hear ! And the Lily 
 
 whispers — I wait" ' : ' 
 
 JID you notice that I missed two 
 lines when I read you that first 
 stanza; and think that I had 
 forgotten them? Hear them 
 now: — 
 
 44 Come into the garden, Maud, 
 For the black bat, night, has flown, 
 Come into the garden, Maud, 
 I am here at the gate, alone," 
 
 |C Who is it, think you, who stands at the 
 'gate of this sweeter garden alone, waiting for 
 you ? Did you ever hear, not of a Maud, but 
 ia Madeleine, who went down to her garden' 
 
 m, 
 
 i 
 
in the dawn, and found One waiting at th< 
 gate, whom she supposed to be the gardener ?^ 
 Have you not sought Him often; — sought 
 Him in vain, all through the night ; — sought 
 Him in vain at the gate of that old gardei 
 where the fiery sword is set ? He is never 
 there ; but at the gate of THIS garden He isj 
 waiting always — waiting to take your hand! 
 — ready to go down to see the fruits of the! 
 valley, to see whether the vine has flourished, 
 and the pomegranate budded. There you shall 
 see with Him the little tendrils of the vines that] 
 His hand is guiding — there you shall see the 
 pomegranate springing where His hand cast 
 the sanguine seed ; — more : you shall see the 
 troops of the angel keepers that, with their 
 wings, wave away the hungry birds from the] 
 path-sides where He has sown, and call t< 
 each other between the vineyard rows, " Take^ 
 us the foxes, the little foxes, that spoil the 
 vines, for our vines have tender grapes*" Oh, 
 — you queens — you queens ! among the hills' 
 and happy greenwood of this land of yours, 
 I shall the foxes have holes, and the birds ofj 
 the air have nests ; and in your cities, shall! 
 the stones cry out against you, that they are' 
 the only pillows where the Son of Man can 
 ^lay His head ? 
 
APPENDIX 
 
 NOTE A, p. io. I ought, in order to make this 
 assertion fully understood, to have noted the various 
 weaknesses which lower the ideal of other great 
 characters of men in the Waverley novels — the 
 selfishness and narrowness of thought in Red' 
 gauntlet, the weak religious enthusiasm in Edward 
 Glendinning, and the like; and I ought to have 
 noticed that there are several quite perfect characters 
 sketched sometimes in the backgrounds ; three — let 
 us accept joyously this courtesy to England and 
 her soldiers — are English officers: Colonel Gardiner, 
 Colonel Talbot, and Colonel Mannering. 
 NOTE B, p. 19. Coventry Patmore. You cannot 
 read him too often or too carefully ; as far as I know 
 he is the only living poet who always strengthens 
 and purifies; the others sometimes darken, and 
 nearly always depress and discourage, the imagina* 
 tion they deeply seize* 
 
 NOTE C, p. 25. Observe, it is 44 Nature " who is 
 speaking throughout, and who says, 44 while she 
 and I together live." 
 
 NOTE D, p. 39* "Joan of Arc: in reference to 
 M. Michelet's ' History of France/ n De Quincey's 
 Works. Vol. iii. p. 217. 
 
 NOTE E, p. 45. I wish there were a true order of 
 chivalry instituted for our English youth of certain 
 ranks, in which both boy and girl should receive, 
 at a given age, their knighthood and ladyhood by 
 true title ; attainable only by certain probation and 
 trial both of character and accomplishment; and 
 
 57 
 
to be forfeited, on conviction, by their peers, of any- 
 dishonourable act* Such an institution would be 
 entirely, and with all noble results, possible, in a 
 nation which loved honour* That it would not 
 be possible among us, is not to the discredit of 
 the scheme. 
 
 J* 
 
 Ji* Ji* k^f* 
 
 iJT »JT »JT iJT 
 
 i^f* 
 
 jr jt 
 
 58 
 
INDEX 
 
 Alcestis, character of, 14* 
 
 Andromache, as a conception of womanhood, 14* 
 
 Anglesea, scenery of, 40. 
 
 Antigone, character of, 14* 
 
 Armour, buckled on by women, meaning of, 18* 
 
 Art models, what the finest are, 35. 
 
 Athena, queen of art, literature, and virtue, 15* 
 
 Author, 99 Queen's Gardens,** title of, 3* 
 
 Beauty of body and heart must coexist, 24* 
 
 Bible, the, Moses MYTHICAL, 15* 
 
 „ quoted passim, 54, 55* 
 
 „ quoted or referred to j — 
 
 Exodus ii. On women, Moses educated by 
 
 one, 15. 
 
 Ps. cxx. 4* Sharp arrows of the mighty, with 
 
 coals of juniper, 40* 
 Song of SoL i'u is* Take us the foxes . . . spoil our 
 
 grapes, 55* 
 
 „ „ iv. 16* Come, thou south • ♦ ♦ flow out, 
 52-53* 
 
 Isaiah xxxv* u Be thou glad, O thirsty desert 
 
 (LXX* version), facing page 1« 
 John xx. IS And she, supposing him to be the 
 
 gardener, 55. 
 Acts xvii* 23. Altar to unknown God, 42. 
 
 Books, choice of, for the young, to be by the good in them, 
 not the absence of bad, 33-34. 
 „ good, to be gone to for advice, 5* 
 „ the right use of, 5* 
 Cassandra, 14. 
 
 Character, girls', hardened by restraint, 25* 
 
 61 
 
Chaucer's conception of women, 15* 
 
 Chivalry, suggestion for a modern order of, Appendix, 
 Note E- 
 
 „ the principles of, and women, 17* 
 Christ, still ** waiting in the garden " for noble women, 55* 
 Coals, England made a furnace ground, 40. 
 Cowardice, social, 36* 
 Dante, on women, 12* 
 Dante's Beatrice, 12. 
 
 Matilda, 53* 
 Delight, "vital feelings of" (Wordsworth), 25. 
 De Quincey, on Joan of Arc, 38-39, 
 Desire of power, 45* 
 
 Dolls, the spiritual, of theological women, 30* 
 Duty, instinct for, in the human heart, 44* 
 Education, its true end, must be recognized, u 
 
 ,, girls and boys to learn same things in a different 
 
 way, 30-31* 
 „ nature's influence in, 38 seq* 
 ♦, the use of, to help us to consult the wisest men (in 
 books), s* 
 
 ft value of, in the kingly power it gives, !♦ 
 „ Council on, Report on Welsh school, 41-42* 
 
 Egyptian wisdom conceived as a woman, 15* 
 
 England, to be garden or furnace ground ? 40* 
 
 Gentlewoman, an older title than lady, 45-46* 
 
 Girls, accomplishments of, to be of use to others, 26-27, 
 35-36. 
 
 „ not to be fettered, 25, 34* 
 
 „ cannot be hammered into things, as boys can, 34* 
 
 „ their education to be serious, 36* 
 
 „ intellect ripens quicker than boys', 31* 
 Governesses, social position of, 37* 
 Greek deity, the greatest, a woman, Athena, 15* 
 
 62 
 
Greek poets, conception of women, 14. 
 
 Hereditary honour, 46* 
 
 Heroes, Shakespeare has no, 6* 
 
 History, how written, how to be studied, 27-28* 
 
 Holyhead, scenery of, 40* 
 
 Home, its true quality PEACE, 21. 
 
 „ the duties of man and woman in regard to, 43-44* 
 Homer, women of, 14* 
 
 „ e»g*, Nausicaa, 14* 
 Husband and wife, relations of, 19 seq. 
 Iphigenia, character of, 14* 
 
 Italian poets, conception of women (passages translated by 
 
 D* G* Rossetti), 12-14* 
 Joan of Arc, her education, De Quincey on, 38* 
 Kings, how they should rule, doers of right (Rex), 47* 
 
 „ „ „ princes of peace (Dei Gratii), 48* 
 
 Kingships, spectral, tyrannous and true, 2* 
 
 „ true, based only on superior moral state, 2* 
 Knighthood, modern, suggested, Appendix, Note E* 
 Knowledge, accuracy before depth of, 31* 
 
 „ of women and men, 30 seq. 
 Lady, and * gentlewoman," titles of, 45-46* 
 Laws of nature, their beauty, 27, 
 Lord = law'keeper, 46. 
 Love, instinct of, 44. 
 
 „ sanctifying power of, 18* 
 
 „ trust and, go together in noble hearts, l8* 
 Lovers, the true relation of knight and lady, 17-18* 
 Man and woman, different functions of, 20-21* 
 
 „ duty to the state, the expansion of that to home, 
 43-44* 
 
 „ has less sympathy and hope than woman, 49. 
 „ the world must harden every, 21. 
 Marriage, the seal of service, 19-20* 
 
 63 
 
Menai straits, scenery of the, 40* 
 Mersey, the, scenery of, 40* 
 
 Michelet, " History of France," 38, and Appendix, Note D. 
 Miser, the, 49* 
 
 Models, the finest art, true, simple, useful, 35* 
 Moses, educated by a woman, 15* 
 Music, what kind the best is, 35* 
 Nature, influence of, in education, 38 seq« 
 Novels, choice of, 32, 33. 
 » effect of, 33, 34* 
 
 „ good, are studies in moral anatomy, 32* 
 „ not to interest so much as to interfere with the real 
 interest of life, 32. 
 Pagan religion, peopled the fair earth with spirits, 42* 
 Patmore, Coventry, to be carefully read, his power, Appendix, 
 Note B, 
 
 „ „ quoted, " Ah ! wasteful woman,** 19* 
 
 Peace, the Prince of, the title enlarged on, 48* 
 Penelope, 14. 
 
 Position in life, education and a, 36* 
 Power, our instinctive love of, 44. 
 
 ,, what, to be coveted, 45* 
 Praise, woman's great function, 21. 
 
 Prayer-book, H for all who are desolate and oppressed," 29* 
 " Queen's Gardens," title of, referred to, 3* 
 Regina means right'doer, 47. 
 Rex = right-doer, 47. 
 
 Rossetti, D. G«, translation of Italian poetry quoted, 12-14* 
 Scenery, value of, by England and Greece, 40-41* 
 School, account of a "Welsh (1848), 41* 
 Scott, Sir W. t has only three heroic men, la 
 
 ,, early romances of, io* 
 
 „ merit and truth of, io* 
 
 ,, poetry of, 10* 
 
 64 
 
Scott* Sir "W*, continued : — 
 
 „ women of, noble (Alice Bridgenorth, Alice Lee, 
 
 Lilias Redgauntlet, Diana Vernon, Catherine 
 Seyton, Rose Bradwardine, Ellen Douglas, 
 Flora Maclvor, Jeanie Deans), 11. 
 „ quoted or referred to: — 
 
 Edward Glendinning, weakness of, Appendix, 
 Note A* 
 
 Colonel Mannering, Talbot, Gardiner, Appen- 
 dix, Note A* 
 Claverhouse, heroic, 10* 
 Rob Roy, heroic, 10. 
 Dandie Dinmont, 10. 
 Redgauntlet, Appendix, Note A, 
 Sensualist, the, 49. 
 
 Shakespeare, catastrophe of his plays, due to a man's fault, 
 redeemed by a woman's virtue, 7 seq* 
 „ has no heroes, only heroines, 6* 
 „ view of women, 9. 
 
 their dignity , o seq« 
 his good women faultless, 6 seq* 
 his wicked women, <?♦ 
 „ quoted or referred to : — 
 
 Antony and Cleopatra, Antony not a hero, 6* 
 As You Like It, 6* 
 
 „ „ Orlando, not a hero, 6, 
 Coriolanus, catastrophe of the play, & 
 „ not a hero, 6* 
 
 „ Virgilia, Shakespeare's loveliest 
 heroine, 7. 
 Cymbeline, catastrophe of, 8* 
 Goneril, an exception to the ordinary laws of 
 
 life, o* 
 Hamlet, not a hero, 6. 
 
 65 
 
Shakespeare, quoted or referred to, continued : — 
 Hamlet, catastrophe of, 9. 
 
 „ Ophelia, the only weak woman in Shake* 
 speare, 9* 
 Henry V*, 6* 
 
 Julius Caesar, not a hero, 6* 
 
 Lear, his fall due to his bad judgment, 7« 
 
 „ Kent, not quite a hero, 6« 
 Measure for Measure, catastrophe of, 8* 
 Merchant of Venice, 6* 
 
 iii* 2, ** unlessoned girl,'* 8* 
 Midsummer Night's Dream, Helena, 8* 
 Much Ado, Beatrice, 8* 
 
 „ Hero, 8* 
 Othello, catastrophe of, 7* 
 „ not a hero, 6* 
 „ Emilia, 7* 
 Romeo and Juliet, 6* 
 „ catastrophe of, 8* 
 „ Romeo, not a hero, 6. 
 Two Gentlemen of Verona, 6« 
 
 „ „ Julia, 8. 
 Winter's Tale, catastrophe of, 8. 
 Snowdon, scenery, 40-41* 
 Society, falsity of, and girls' education, 36* 
 Spenser's noble women, Una and Britomart, 15. 
 State, duty of man and woman to the, 43. 
 
 „ full meaning of the word, 2* 
 Teachers of the young, their social position, 37* 
 Tennyson, Maud quoted, ** Come into the garden," 54* 
 Thackeray, the lessons taught by, vary with the reader, 33* 
 Theology, women not to study, 29* 
 True, the, is harmonious, 5, 
 Tutors, social position of, 37* 
 
 66 
 
Vassals, our, to be fed by us, not to feed us, 47. 
 
 Wales, Report on (1848), and school in, 41* 
 
 "War, women responsible for, as they could hinder it, 48. 
 
 "Wife, should guide her husband, 20* 
 „ the true, is a home-maker, 22* 
 
 "Women, beauty of, what, 24* 
 
 ft „ and on what depended, 26* 
 
 „ changefulness of noble, 23* 
 
 a deficient in accuracy and precision ? 8-9* 
 
 M dignity of, according to the great poets, 6 seq* 
 
 ,, duties to the state, the expansion of that to their 
 
 homes, 43. 
 tt tt public as well as private, 44* 
 tt education of, 23 seq* 
 
 tt tt its end stated, the reading of history, 
 
 27 seq* 
 
 » tt (she is to learn that she may* feel and 
 
 judge, not that she may know), 27 
 seq. 
 
 tt M to learn some one science, 27* 
 
 n t» but not theology, 29* 
 
 „ knowledge of, to be accurate, if not deep, 30 seq* 
 tt tt contrasted with that of men, 30 seq* 
 
 H men and, their relation, 4, 5, 16 seq* 
 tt tt women to buckle on men's armour in every 
 
 sense, 18* 
 
 tt not inferior to men, but different from, 2a 
 
 „ not the slaves of men, 4-5* 
 
 „ and men, their different functions, 20 seq* 
 
 tt obedience to, in noble times, 17* 
 
 tt position of, 4 seq* 
 
 „ praise, their great function, 21* 
 
 tt to be queens, 47 seq. 
 
 tt responsible for the misery of the world, 48-49* 
 
 67 
 
Women, continued ; — 
 
 „ rights, and man's, not independent Of conflicting, 4* 
 „ sympathies of, not to be confined to their homes, 
 44. 
 
 „ worship and honour of, in all Christian times, 17* 
 Wordsworth, his exquisite RIGHTNESS, 24. 
 „ quoted ; — 
 
 " Three years she grew," 24* 
 ** A countenance in which did meet," 26* 
 Work, right amusement is found in right, 47* 
 
 68 
 
Here ends OF QUEENS' GARDENS 
 By JOHN RUSKIN, Printed at the 
 Ballantyne Press, Edinburgh, and 
 Published by George Allen, London, 
 in the Year 1902 jt jt j* jt 
 
i 
 
Yi G . I'it Y Lb 17 F \i , 
 
 LO f I Tj O N , w. c . ^-