Even if a radical change is imminent, there is no reason to be so fiercely contentious about it. Let us remember Dr. Watts, and be pacified. _Our_ little hands were never made to tear each other’s eyes. It is possible surely to plead for female suffrage without saying spiteful and sarcastic things about men, especially as it is not their opposition, but the listless indifference of our own sex, which stands between the eager advocate and her vote. There is still less propriety in permitting this angry sentiment to bias our conceptions of morality, and we pay but a poor tribute to woman in assuming that she should be privileged to sin. The damnation of Faust and the apotheosis of Margaret make one of the most effective of stage illusions; but it is not a safe guide to practical rectitude, and we might do well to remember that it is not Goethe’s final solution of the problem. In our vehement reaction from the stringent rules of the past, we are now assuming that the seven deadly sins grow less malignant in woman’s hands, and that she can shift the burden of moral responsibility to the shoulders of that arch offender, man. The shameful evidence of the courts is bandied about in social circles, and made the subject-matter of denunciatory rhetoric on the part of those whom self-respect should silence. It does not strengthen one’s confidence in the future, to see the present lack of moderation and sanity in people who are going to reform the world. When wives and mothers meet to denounce with bitter eloquence the immorality of men, and then ask contributions for a monument to Mary Wollstonecraft, “who suffered social martyrdom in England a hundred years ago, for advocating the rights of woman,” one feels a little puzzled as to the mental attitude of these impetuous creatures. A sense of humor would save us from many discouraging outbreaks, but humor is not a common attribute of reformers. It is the peace-maker of the world, and this is the day of contentions.
It is the curious custom of modern men of letters to talk to the world a great deal about their work; to explain its conditions, to uphold its value, to protest against adverse criticism, and to interpret the needs and aspirations of mankind through the narrow medium of their own resources. A good many years have passed since Mr. Arnold noticed the growing tendency to express the very ordinary desires of very ordinary people by such imposing phrases as “laws of human progress” and “edicts of the national mind.” To-day, if a new story or a new play meets with unusual approbation, it is at once attributed to some sudden mental development of society, to some distinct change in our methods of regarding existence. We are assured without hesitation that all stories and all plays in the near future will be built up upon these favored models.