Lecture Five.

EDUCATION.

_{Life a School—Education a Work of Progress—Schools of Vice—Every Circumstance a Teacher—Kinds of Education—Female Education—True Womanly Ambition—Improve your Opportunities—Principles should be Understood—Time Trifled Away—Some Excuses—Society Needs Woman's Influence—Education as it is—Girls should have Something to Live For.}

"Life is real, life is earnest." To make life grand is the end of living. God has a great purpose in every human soul; that purpose is its truthful education. Life is God's school. He is its great superintendent; his Son is prime instructor. The world is His primary school-house, or, rather, our primary school-house built by him. Here we learn the alphabet of things; and learn to spell and read a little from the great book of God. Here we sit in our places and learn our first lessons; stand in our classes and recite them. Here we get ready for that college which God has built for us on the spiritual Mount Zion. In this lower school we prepare for the department above. Our position in that department must be determined by our dutifulness and progress in this. Oh, solemn thought! We must be measured by our merit; we must stand in our lot; "every man in his own order." The deeds done in the body shall tell upon the life of the spirit. What we make for ourselves now, shall be ours in the college-hall above. Wisdom gained in life shall not be lost in death. It will live a halo of brightness, a crown of glory, when "death, the last enemy, shall be destroyed." God did not ask us whether we would come into this primary school or not; whether we would take this lower-world life. Neither will He ask us whether we will go into the higher department; whether we will take the upper-world life. He gave the one; he will give the other. But the use we make of these lives He has put not a little into our own hands. What will be in these lives He has left not a little with us. Our standings we are to choose to a certain extent. Our characters are the workmanship of our own hands. Our worth is of our own making. Our Education is a personal matter. God has given us minds, a school, a study-room, teachers, all the books of nature, experience, revelation, reason, duty, affection, and now commands us to educate ourselves, promising to be with us and assist us as our kind Superintendent in this grand work of life.

Education, strictly speaking, covers the whole area of life. It is the word which means all God asks of us, all we owe to him, the world, and ourselves—that great word which expresses the sum total of human duty. Nor is it confined to this present period of life. To educate is the work of Heaven. Time and eternity are the school periods of intelligence. Reason may have an eternal growth. Conscience may widen its powers and deepen its sanctities in heaven. Affection may grow in beauty and fervor through immortal ages. Mind may expand and intensify through eternity. To educate is to develop mind; to expand its capacities; to strengthen its energies; to deepen its affections; to elevate its aspirations; to sharpen its perceptions; to quicken its actions; to intensify its emotions; to harmonize its powers; to empower its will, and magnify its sweep of action.

Education is a work of progress. It begins in life and has no end. Death does not terminate it. We learn the elements of things below. Above we shall study their essences. We progress in proportion to our own efforts. Education may be good or bad, right or wrong. Reason may grow strong in error, may revel in falsities. The will may be mighty for evil. The heart may grow in vice, and the passions expand in misrule. The mind may be educated into terrible confusion, so that its passions will clash in battle array, and its powers war with each other like exterminating demons. The din of mental warfare and the clash of spiritual arms are heard in almost every soul. Terrible conflicts are within us. And whole fields of slaughtered virtues are swept over by their death-dealing siroccos. Like nations of the earth our mental powers are grouped together, and group confronts group like embattled armies, sending their hissing arrows of fiery death into each other's ranks. Power strikes at power, like single combatants on the field of strife. Such is the awful sight seen by God in many a human soul. And such to a greater or less extent is what He sees in each one of us; so direful are the results of bad Education.

Few of us have been educated altogether aright. We have gained much mental strength in wicked conflict. Our passions have expanded in lawless riot. Our mental arms have grown strong in corrupting labors. Our energies have been made vigorous in vicious employments. Our feet have been made active in the dance of folly and the race of mammon. We have risen to power in the service of a tyrant master. We have done the bidding of sin, and made our soldiers broad to bear its Atlas burdens. But Education has made us mighty in evil. Giants in vice stalk about us daily who were sweet and beautiful in their babyhood as ever smiled in a mother's face. On every hand we meet with the graduates of some school of vice, in whom the powers of darkness are mighty for evil. Some come out from the dark holes of intemperance; some from the luxurious saloons of gambling; some from the gilded halls of fashion; some from those dark places where virtue dies a bleeding sacrifice to sensuality. These are the schools in which the mighty in wickedness are educated. And then we have lesser schools all about us in which the young take lessons in vice: schools on the street, schools at home, schools at the toilet, schools in pleasure circles, schools in the market and counting-room, where they take lessons in deception, slander, folly, anger, backbiting, sensuality, and vice. Our schools for Education in evil are numerous, and their teachers are legion. I believe much more in evil Education than in innate depravity. The little cherubs that come into our arms right from the hands of Deity are innocent and pure. The skies above us and the flowers around us are not purer and sweeter than they. Their little souls are immaculate. "Of such is the kingdom of heaven." I can not believe in depraved babyhood; but I must believe in depraved youth and manhood. All about me are the sinful wrecks of once pure souls. It is wrong Education that has made them the sad, pitiable things they are. Oh, what wretched contortions of God's beautiful handiwork have men made of themselves! Of all the things that God has made, the human soul is most perfect and beautiful. The flower and trees and fields are beautiful. The flashing aurora, the golden clouds, the sapphire sky, are beautiful. The circling planets, the blazing sun, the starry canopy, are beautiful. But what are they compared to a human soul? What is an ephemeral flower or an age-lasting star compared with glorious reason, with eternal love, with deathless benevolence, and conscience? What were the material universe with all its sublime grandeur and awe-inspiring magnificence with no soul to gaze upon it? And yet perfect and beautiful as were our souls when God gave them to us, what unsightly, miserable, demoniac things we have made of them! It is evil Education that has done it all. We have trained our minds in wrong schools. We have educated our powers at the feet of evil teachers. We have taken lessons in the science of wickedness. We have followed bad examples and copied corrupt manners. And we still do so. These things have made us what we are.

Our Education is not all got in our organized schools. Our hired teachers and printed books are not all that act on our powers to develop them. Life is one grand school, and its every circumstance a teacher. Society pours in its influences upon us like the thousand streams that flood the ocean. Scholastic men and women may speak of book Education; it is mine to speak of life Education. Life is my field and my theme; that great common arena where men and women do battle with the forces about them.

We are educating all the time, and the question with us should be, How do we educate ourselves? What manner of men and women do we make of ourselves? The great question of life is an educational one. We all get an Education; but the kind is the point for us to determine. Some are educated in vice, some in folly, some in selfishness, some in deception, some in sensuality, some in nothing in particular and every thing in general, some in goodness, some in truth and right, some in theology, and some in religion. Our kinds of Education are legion. We can not live without being educated some way. Every day gives us many lessons in life. Every thought leaves its impression on the mind. Every feeling weaves a garment for the spirit. Every passion plows a furrow into the soul. All is motion in that mysterious, wonder-working house in which we ourselves live—the mind.

Every hour of life has solemn, fearful results. The question should hang all the time written in blazing capitals in the firmament of each soul, "How am I educating?" It is wicked to let the crazy world educate us as it will. It is awfully hazardous to yield ourselves up, as most people do, to the circumstances of society about us. It is a fearful risk to plunge into the stream of popular custom and float on like a dead sponge drinking in its turbid water. Most people are like mocking-birds and monkeys, repeating all they hear and mimicking all they see. Our duty is to educate ourselves as we should.

Having hinted these general principles of Education, we may now address ourselves especially to young women, and apply them to their life. The daily life-education of the mass of young women is not what it should be. It is much like the life-education of the mass of young men. It is the Education of circumstances, custom, society, etc. Young women live, think, and act just as society dictates. They wear what fashion says shall be worn; they say what etiquette say is proper; they do what custom dictates; their ideas of gracefulness, propriety, and life are molded in the common mint of popular sentiment. They float on the stream of society mere automatons in the great hand of the world. They do not direct their own Education as though they had any object in life. They seem to lay helpless in the hands of the world, the pets or playthings of the day. These remarks are not very inapplicable to young men also. There is a great body of young men who float on the stream of life with no self-direction. Ask one of them what he lives for, and he will tell you, "to chew tobacco, swear, be a man;" and his idea of being a man is to be able to do these things with grace and dignity. To ask any one of the mass of young women what she lives for, and if you can get her to say it out, she will tell you, "to get married." Now it is certainly right to get married, and to live with this object in view. But there is a grand educational preparation needed for this. And this preparation is the very thing most neglected. Every young woman should have some noble purpose in life, some grand aim, grand in its character. She should, in the first place, know what she is, what powers she possesses, what influences are to go out from her, what position in life she was designed to fill, what duties are resting upon her, what is she capable of being, what fields of profit and pleasure are open to her, how much joy and satisfaction she may find in a true life of womanly activity. When she has duly considered these things, she should then form the high purpose of being a true woman, and of making every circumstance bend to her will for the accomplishment of this noble purpose. There is no higher thing beneath the bending heavens than a true woman. There is no nobler attainment this side of the spirit-land than lofty womanhood. There is no purer ambition than that which craves this crown for her mortal brow. To be a genuine woman, full of womanly instincts and power, possessing the intuitive genius of her penetrating soul and the subduing authority of her gentle, yet resolute will, is to be a peer of earth's highest intelligence. All young women have this noble prize before them. They may all put on the glorious crown of womanhood. They may make their lives grand in womanly virtue. There is in every woman-child the seed of womanhood. She may water and nourish that seed till it shall blossom in her soul and make her spiritually beautiful. Woman has a power, a woman-power, something peculiarly her own in her moral influences, which, when duly developed, makes her queen over a wide realm of spirit. This she can not exert only as her powers are cultivated. It is cultivated woman that wields the scepter of authority among men. Wherever cultivated woman dwells, there is refinement, intellectual and moral power, life in its highest form. To be a cultivated woman, one must commence early and make this the grand aim of her life. Whether she work or play, travel or remain at home, converse with friends or study books, gaze at flowers or toil in the kitchen, visit the pleasure party or the sanctuary of God, she should keep her object before her mind and tax all her powers for its attainment. She must learn to make the most of opportunities. One fault with our young women is, that opportunities avail them but little. They see much and perceive but little, talk much and think but little, hear much and learn but little, read much and acquire but little.

I suppose almost every young woman has seen many steamboats, yet it may be doubtful whether one understands the mechanical principle by which they are propelled and directed. They have seen the flowers and vegetation, birds and beasts, of our region of country, and yet they doubtless are about as ignorant of them as of the products of the torrid zone. They live under our form of government, yet how many know wherein it differs from other governments! They have heard or read of almost every science, yet how little acquainted are they with the commonest principles of science! They have all had their countenances daguerreotyped, yet who knows how it is done? They all wear silk, cotton, linen, yet who knows the history of either one of these articles of apparel? They have bodies "fearfully and wonderfully made," yet how little they know of their structure, laws, and uses! They have minds, beautiful and immortal gifts of divine wisdom and goodness, yet how little attention have they given to learn their principles of action! All around them are little worlds of every-day things upon which they have never bestowed a passing thought, things which are full of interest; yet the common habit of seeing much and thinking little has led them into this same superficial habit. It is like the young man of whom I was told a few days since, who had traveled all over the world, rode on every sea and ocean, and visited every principal seaport, and yet knew nothing of any of them. It is a sad fault with us all, and especially with women—we don't think enough. The mass of young women trifle a great portion of their life away on the smallest imaginable things. They chatter like birds and gabble like geese, without the trouble of thinking. The things they see and hear every day awaken no consecutive thought. The stars shine above them, and they call them pretty things, but never ask the astronomic story of their magnificence. The world beats its great march of life around them, but they seek not to know the rich lessons of human activity therein. I know that society does not hold out so great inducements for woman to think and educate herself as it ought. I know woman is oppressed with legal and customic disabilities. I know she is shut out from many fields of activity and industry for which she is eminently fitted by her natural endowments. I know that her labor is not half rewarded, that her ambition is cramped into a narrow field. I know that by custom and law she is the slave of man, who holds her person, children, and property in his custody. I know that men think they must be silly and simpering in woman's presence, because they suppose she can appreciate and enjoy nothing higher. I know that many men have an awful horror of "strong-minded women," really educated women. I know that any thing beyond housewifery or parlor gracefulness by many is considered unwomanly; yet woman may overcome all the obstacles in her way if she will educate herself to think, and think soundly and forcibly. She must be her own deliverer from these barbaric customs and laws, and her own thought must be the instrument of delivery. Let women everywhere become solid thinkers so far as their capacities will admit, instead of triflers; let their life-education be deep, useful, and practical, instead of superficial and theoretical; let them be as well acquainted with the principles of society as they are with those of fashion; let them be as much interested in human progress as they are in dress and gossip; let them take into their hands the keys of knowledge and unlock the storehouses of practical wisdom all about them, and go in and lay hold of the treasures, and human society would soon blossom as the rose. The great thing needed now by our society is more woman-influence—more woman-thought, character, and power. Our female Education is too superficial, trifling, babyish. Our girls are not half developed. Our young women do not exhibit one half their real strength and beauty. Their minds are robbed of much of their natural vigor. They are dwarfed by their delicate nutriment.

As soon as a little girl begins to be a young lady she must be shut up in the house; talked to as though she did not know much; read novels; be dressed up; go to parties; have suitors; take lessons in music; have a dancing master; visit the theater; go a term or two to the young ladies' seminary to practice calisthenics; study Botany without seeing a flower, Astronomy without looking at a star or planet, Geology without stepping into the dirt or putting her hand upon a rock; write a half-dozen compositions on friendship, mother, and home; daub a little in water-paints; receive a diploma, and then set up for matrimony. This is female Education—without an object, without ambition, without point or force, without strength, depth, or breadth. It is simply a little outside polish. It does not teach how to think; it does not develop mind; it does not confer power; it does not form character; it does not fix the will, direct the life, establish opinion, deepen sentiment, or do any thing to make a true woman.

Our young women want a more vigorous, practical, and useful Education, one that shall develop strength, character and resolution; one that shall give growth to the mind, power to the will, and efficiency to the life; one that shall enable any woman to be independent, true to herself, to entertain and maintain her own opinions, to get her own living, to mark out her own course in life, to count one in any position she may choose to occupy, to be all that may belong to a free, independent, accountable, intelligent creature. They want to be educated so they will know their own powers, understand their own duties, and comprehend the value of life too well to waste it on trifles. They want to be able to know the world in which they move, to take an active part in all life's duties, to converse intelligently upon all ordinary subjects, and make a useful figure in the circles in which they move.

Woman's powers are eminently practical. She has a strong judgment, a rich store of practical good sense, an ample fund of tact, skill, shrewdness, inventiveness, and management. Women are the best managers in the world so far as they have had experience and a field of action. Not one whit behind are they in every department of life to which they have had access.

Now if our girls were reared to the practical duties of life, trained to some great and good end, taught to live for something, have some grand and noble purpose in life, and live to that purpose, how much richer in all that embellishes life and magnifies humanity would be our world!

Our boys have something to live for. Each one says, "I'll be this or that; I'll do so and so when I'm a man. The world must know that I live. I must hew out my way, make me a mark, tell a story that my fellows shall hear." And so each one educates himself into his purpose. But how is it with our girls? What do they live for? What do they expect to be and do when they are women? They have powers equal to the boys—can play as well, run as fast, learn as readily, manage as skillfully, perceive as quickly, are as dutiful, useful, and efficient. Why should the boys grow up with a great and good purpose before them, while the girls grow up for nothing? See what a woman has to do, and what mighty springs of action and influence she holds in her hands. She sits on a throne of power at the very fountain of life. She is goddess of all the springs and little rivulets of humanity. She makes men and trains them. As mother, wife, and friend she wields a triune scepter of vast power. She rears the twigs that grow into the oaks of the world. She may bend them at her will. If woman was rightly educated, who could tell what a race of men would grow up to people the coming ages? How can the woman-mind, undeveloped, untrained, uninspired with great aims, grand and brave resolutions and actions, impress the minds of the generation to come with strength, power, activity, intellectual and moral vigor? It can not. Oh, it is a burning shame that our women are not educated to a greater vigor of body and mind! They should be strong in will thought, action, love, resolution. They should be stout-hearted, high-souled, brave-purposed, yet always womanly. If the world were mine, and I could educate but one sex, it should be the girls. I could make a greater and better world of the next generation by educating the girls of this. It is not half so important that our legislators be wise, as that our mothers be so. It is not half so important that our men be brave, as that our women be so. Strengthen the women-heart, and you strengthen the world. Give me a nation of noble women, and I will give you a noble nation. Cultivate the woman-mind if you would cultivate the race.