Is the girl satisfied? Is it really what she wants, all she wants? If she were a Circassian slave, perhaps it would do. For the daughter of free, active, intelligent, modern America it does not do; and therefore our girls in ever-increasing numbers are leaving home. It is not that they do not love their homes; not that they do not want homes of their own in due season; it is the protest of every healthy human soul against the-home-and-nothing-else.
Our poorer girls are going into mills and shops, our richer ones into arts and professions, or some educational and philanthropic work. We oppose this proof of racial growth and vitality by various economic fallacies about "taking the bread out of other women's mouths"--and in especial claim that it is "competing with men," "lowering wages" and the like. We talk also, in the same breath, or the next one, about "the God-given right to work"--and know not what we mean by that great phrase.
To work is not only a right, it is a duty. To work to the full capacity of one's powers is necessary for human development. It is no benefit to a human being to keep him, or her, in down-wrapped idleness, it is a gross injury. If a man could afford to put daughters and wife to bed and have them fed and washed like babies, would that be a kindness? "They do not have to walk!" he might say. Yes, they do have to, else would their muscles weaken and shrink, and beauty and health disappear. For the health and beauty of the body it must have full exercise. For the health and beauty of the mind it must have full exercise. No normal human mind can find full exercise in dusting the parlour and arranging the flowers; no, nor in twelve hours of nerve-exhaustion in the kitchen. Exhaustion is not exercise.
"But they are free to study--to read, to improve their minds!" we protest. Minds are not vats to be filled eternally with more and ever more supplies. It is _use_, large, free, sufficient use that the mind requires, not mere information. Our college girls have vast supplies of knowledge; how can they use it in the home? Could a college boy apply his education appropriately to "keeping house"--and, if not, how can the girl? Full use of one's best faculties--this is health and happiness for both man and woman.