Henry M. Pierce

“ Piety is not only the highest of duties, but the greatest of privileges.
Young Ladies, life is so limited, our responsibilities are so great, the consequences of pursuing a wrong course are so terrible and destructive,—even so far as this life goes,—that you cannot afford to make a mistake at the outset. Experience is not always a sure guide—it cannot teach all the important truths that concern this life; nor can you trust implicitly to the wisdom of either parent or teacher, nor commit yourselves to the guidance of passion, or to the customs and opinions of the world. ”

“ Of His glory and His beauty, all the glory and the beauty of the things that He has made, are but faint emblems and reflected lights. He alone is worthy to be loved "with all your heart, and mind, and soul, and strength." ”

“ Especially is this law of kindness needed in the speech of woman, whose hasty, thoughtless words can influence to fury the pride and wrath of man, and set on fire his heart with the fires of hell. Dissensions in families, hatred between neighbors, enmity between states and nations, follow when woman's tongue embitters man's jealousy and passion.
If the sphere of woman is hereafter to be enlarged, we all should more earnestly hope, and more fervently pray, that she may everywhere carry with her "the ornament of a meek and quiet spirit, which is in the sight of God of great price." ”

“ We need not fear that the truth developed by different nations, will or can be lost. Truth once known can never be hidden. The results of each generation and century, pass on into the future, and are interwoven into the woof of our ever-growing civilization. ”

“ This is the true ground of the principle which we before laid down, and which we would extend to every grade of society, from the highest to the lowest, viz., that the wife should have as good an education as the husband; and, what is of equal importance, the mother should have as good an education as the children.
Whatever breaks in upon the oneness of the family, brings with it evil for which it cannot furnish any sufficient compensation, either to woman or to man. The destruction of the family is the destruction of woman: it is that of man also. ”

“ Equality, though it excludes the idea of inferiority, is consistent with diversity. There is a difference between the sexes, that at once raises the question whether there should not be a difference in their education.
After the most careful thought that I could give to the subject, I am of the opinion that it should be the same to a much greater extent than most persons are willing to concede. Up to a certain point, the education of men is much the same: beyond that point comes in a special training. Thus, on leaving college, the young man who is to pursue law, receives a legal training. ”

“ You are thus brought into communion with the Father of your spirits;—with God, who alone is sufficient to fill all the aspirations of the soul. He alone is wise enough to be your sufficient counsellor;—He alone is strong enough to give mortals strength. ”

“ So is also our third proposition—which exhausts this branch of the subject—that if woman be superior to man, she should receive a better education than man: for it is a first principle in morals, that every power which God gave, He meant should be unfolded to its fullest extent.
I am fully persuaded that the time is not far distant, when it will be thought almost incredible that the question of the inferiority of woman should ever have been seriously debated. For it is not without higher warrant than that of human reason, that I would claim for woman an equal place by the side of man. ”

“ But with the great majority of families that compose the body-politic, the spending of a little of their very little money is a question of moment, that comes up from day to day, and almost from hour to hour: and if a garment cannot be bought, or a meal provided, without raising the question of separate pecuniary interests between the heads of the family, and that too in the presence of the children, the unity of the home, its sacred peace, and its hallowed lessons, are at an end; and it may be that the strong passions so constantly appealed to, will rend the family asunder. ”

“ If, then, it is best for the young man that by a liberal education, his memory should be strengthened, his reasoning powers disciplined, his judgment matured, his mind enlarged—why is it not best for the young woman also? This is a question for those who differ with us to answer. It is a question that none would seriously ask, were it not that the minds of many are unconsciously swayed by a belief in the essential inferiority of woman. ”

“ This kindness of spirit, this charity, is a high Christian grace; but it might almost be taught by experience, seeing how little we really know the motives that sway the human soul, and how often the severe judgments which we pronounce on our fellow-mortals, have to be reconsidered with much pain and self humiliation, when perhaps it is forever too late to right the wrong, and to recompense the suffering that we have occasioned. ”

“ But as we have not time to pursue to any considerable extent more than one of these departments, I would give a rudimentary training in the classics, and devote the best energies of the young to those studies which have for their objects, life and its pursuits, man and his destiny, God and His works.
The sphere of woman differs widely from that of man; but this is neither the time nor the place to unfold our views upon the question in what way, and to what extent, this fact should modify the course of study in a college for women ”

“ Friendships broken, causeless enmities, opportunities for doing good and getting good thrown away, too often teach us—too late to prevent, to ourselves and to others, much lasting injury—the value of the law of kindness as the law of our words. ”

“ I know few things, even in the Scripture, so thoroughly justified by observation, and at the same time so little known and regarded, as this. In the Hebrew Scriptures, the fear of God answers to the love of God in the Christian Scriptures, and so may be taken as equivalent to true piety: and true piety in woman is that alone which really can draw from out the heart of man, the sentiment of lasting veneration. ”

“ When in the beginning God created the heavens, the earth, the sea, and all that in them is, even as He then made laws for the stars and the seas, so did He then fix and determine forever the sphere and the destiny of man and of woman. Driven out of Paradise into the world on account of sin, neither man nor woman took their place at once; and in the nature of the case, woman's sphere was the last of the two to be understood. ”

“ It grew out of an increasing sense of the importance of the duties of women, and of the need that her work should be well done. Hence the establishment of the school, with its course of studies, its libraries, its apparatus, its teachers. A quarter of a century has witnessed a great change in the education of woman; and the position of Rutgers Institute to-day, as a College, marks the character and degree of that change. ”

“ The place that it holds in the book of all human wisdom, is good evidence that a high place was meant to be given to woman in the Hebrew Scripture; its opening and its closing words, moreover, strengthen this impression. The value of a perfect woman "is far above rubies." "The heart of her husband doth safely trust in her; he shall have no need of spoil." Precious gems—the favorite form of wealth among the Orientals—are thus disparaged in comparison with her; and he that hath a true woman, needs no other riches. ”

“ The question, then, whether our civilization is to advance or to retrograde—stand still it cannot—depends on the place hereafter to be given to woman. As to this question, the present seems to be a sort of crisis. The signs point both ways; on the whole, the prospect is hopeful and cheering: but we must either go back or go on; we must become either more Asiatic or more Christian. ”

“ On the contrary, early in my college life I thought, and the years of maturer life have strengthened the idea, that in the curriculum of colleges, too little importance attaches to the science of nature, and to the study of the human soul,—not the study of the abstract metaphysics which the schoolmen bequeathed to us, but of man as he is,—and too little importance attaches to the study of the Hebrew and the Christian Scriptures,—the fountain [Pg 7] whence the ever-enlarging river of our civilization flows. ”

“ The family is destroyed when its unity is destroyed. Of various causes tending to this result, we shall speak only of two particulars in our legislation. According to the law of Christ, the husband and wife are one person: to this fact, the old common law in a good degree conformed; but the tendency of recent statutes is to do away with this idea, by making the property of the wife distinct from that of the husband, and giving to her separately its management;—thus at once creating a diversity of interests. ”

“ But the great fact here to be noticed is, that up to a certain point, all liberally educated men are trained much in the same manner. For a long [Pg 6] time, a liberal education seems to take no note of the specific ends, which finally it may be desirable to aim at. It contents itself with enlarging and strengthening the mental powers. It unrolls before the young man the ample page of knowledge, confident that this is the best preparation for any path that he may finally choose. ”

“ I am fully persuaded that upon all great questions touching humanity, the human mind will at length accept the teachings of Christ as final; and the question whether or not woman is the equal of man, I conceive to be authoritatively settled by Him, when he pronounces marriage such a union as excludes the idea that there can be essential inferiority in one of the parties. ”

“ What is the characteristic in woman that should most fasten the affections, and secure the esteem, of man? Is it the varying charm of manner, or beauty of person? The Scripture before us, answers these questions in a few decisive words: "Favor is deceitful,"—that is, an unsatisfying thing—"and [Pg 18] beauty is vain; but a woman that feareth the Lord, she shall be praised." ”

“ Without labor, there is no excellence and no happiness. It is the most vulgar of all vulgar errors, that a lady is a person who does nothing. Such a person would be good for nothing, and miserable indeed. ”

“ The end could not be reached; the bounds that nature had appointed could not be passed.
It is also clear that if woman be the equal of man, she should receive as good an education as man, a proposition too plain for argument. ”

“ These are questions that deeply agitate the public mind. They are, in fact, the leading questions of the day; but in regard to them, I shall not shrink from the utterance of my opinions. Underlying the question of the education of woman, is the question of her equality with man; for if woman be inferior to man, so should be her education.
Some might be disposed to reverse this proposition, and [Pg 4] to say that just in proportion to her inferiority, should her training be more careful and complete. There might seem to be some truth in this idea ”

“ Our object is by no means to discuss these subjects, but merely to glance at them as illustrations of a strong tendency to innovate without due regard to the sacred oneness of the family. Even education is an evil, so far as it may tend to infringe upon this unity ”

“ Again, at the close of the description, it is written, "Give her of the fruit of her hands"—that is, deal justly with her—yield not to the mean spirit, that thinks that whatever is conceded to woman, is so much taken from the birthright of man. The writer goes beyond the proverb of the French: "A good wife is half the battle;" and, though the husband is "known in the gates, when he sitteth among the elders of the land," his prosperity seems wholly attributed to her. ”

“ Saint James tells us that "if any man seemeth to be religious, and bridleth not his tongue, this man's religion is vain." Elsewhere in his Epistle, you may learn how difficult a thing he conceives this to be. It requires a perfect control of one's self, and a large charity. ”