who is an example but the man Moses? Yet he was a great ruler. When there is an example of patience set before us, Job is selected; a great man also. David says of himself, "Surely I behaved and quieted myself as a child that is weaned of his mother." Here are bright examples for our brethren. Meekness, patience, and self-denial, are as bright virtues in men as they are in women, and equally as necessary-nay, more so, if their theory be true, that they are appointed as rulers. They are peculiarly necessary in those who are clothed with authority to prevent them from abusing it; thus we see God eminently endowed his servant Moses with the grace of meekness, to qualify him for his arduous task. God sends none on a warfare at their own charges; the promise is, "As their days, so shall their strength be." When an example of liberality for benevolent purposes is selected, a woman is chosen-a widow casting in her two mites into the treasury, Mark xii. 41, 44. When an example of importunity in prayer is selected, a woman is the subject-a widow also, Luke xviii. 1-8. When Christ selects an example of a laudable desire for wisdom, he selects a woman, the queen of the south, Matt. xii. 42. This serves to show there is nothing peculiar in the Christian virtues, of either male or female.

Now, what an evil it inflicts on man, and all with whom he has intercourse, to say that he is licensed to exercise the "angry and turbulent passions !" Do not these principles lay the ground-work for quarrels and contentions, for wars and murders, and give loose rein to the worst of passions, pride, anger, malice, revenge, and cruelty? How often is this the cause of men's being inmates of the penitentiary, or victims of the gallows! They are taught from their infancy that they are licensed characters to act in this manner. Man has thus "sown the wind, and he may expect to reap the whirlwind."

The same may be said of the moral virtues that has been said of the Christian graces. Man has considered himself a privileged character to indulge in wickedness, because he is the superior being. What would exclude a woman from all respectable society, does not lower a man in the estimation of a great part of the community. A gentleman told us not long since, that he had just been visiting the Ohio

penitentiary, and remarked with a sneer that there were five females among the convicts. We inquired how many male convicts there were. He said five hundred; but he seemed to think that was a small matter, compared with the five women who were there incarcerated. He just spoke the common sentiment of the community; not because they look upon woman as occupying a higher moral standing, or a more elevated position, but because she is an inferior being, not privileged as man. On the same principle a slave would suffer death in the slave states for what would be called chivalry in a white man. Man has arrogated to himself the same standing in the human family that the pope has assumed in the church, and has refused the help-meet that God has provided for him, declaring that it was good for him to be alone in the government of this world. One wrong step always makes room for another. He has been "given up to strong delusion to believe a lie." He considers himself privileged to wallow in debauchery!

"There is, perhaps, no animal," says Hannah More, "so much indebted to subordination for its good behaviour as woman." To what subordination was Mrs. More's good behaviour to be attributed? she never was a wife. Female writers are too apt to be parasitical to the would-be superior half of the human family, and contribute very much to woman's degradation. If she had said, there is, perhaps, no animal that exhibits so much refractory conduct and bad behaviour, in consequence of its insubordination, as man, she would have hit it. Now, this is no hypothetical theory, for it is the legitimate result of arbitrary power; the great and powerful are prone to do as they please, and consider themselves above law. That the "king can do no wrong" is an old maxim. Man incurs an awful responsibility by arrogating to himself such a degree of authority in this world. His claim to authority is proved nugatory by Providence. If any portion of the human family were appointed rulers over their brethren, we would expect them to be conspicuous for the requisite qualifications; "able men, such as fear God, men of truth, hating covetousness." Exod. xviii. 21. "He that ruleth over men must be just; ruling in the fear of God." 2 Sam. xxiii. 3. They would exhibit this character in a good degree, as "God sends none on a warfare

at their own charges." Man was never appointed dictator in the human family, as is very evident from matters of fact. Man's moral endowments are not superior to woman's, for they are fifty per centum lower in the scale of morals, in the aggregate, than are the females. And we think we underrate the per cent., as our jails and penitentiaries bear ample testimony. Our intention is not to make any invidious comparisons, but these matters of fact speak with trumpet tongue, and are certainly worthy of notice. What would we say, if of two races of the human family having the same opportunities of mental and moral culture, nay, one of them double, or even treble, of mental culture, the race thus privileged be fifty per cent. lower in the scale of morals, yet, forsooth, should be appointed censors over their brethren? Would we not scoff at such censorship? Those that cannot rule themselves, give bad evidence of their qualifications to rule others. We deeply deplore the depravity of both sexes, but may not the haughty spirit in man be a reason why God humbles him in a moral point of view, as he always resists the proud? We know there are many of our own sex, particularly about cities, who inhabit the most loathsome abodes of vice and crime; but still their associates in crime, of the other sex, are vastly numerically greater. Our heart sickens, and our hand trembles, when contemplating the sad spectacle! These poor, degraded females, loathsome creatures! are shut out from all decent society, and we say justly, so long as they continue their evil practices, but so cruel and inexorable is the prejudice of mankind against them, that there is no door open for them if they should wish to return to the path of virtue ;* while many those who are their associates in pollution, are the darlings of the community, and those whom men delight to honour, because they are men, and hence privileged debauchees.

of

Many women contribute very much to this partiality. We believe they are more censorious towards their own sex for any deviation from the path of virtue, or for any fault,

* We rejoice to say that societies are now organized by our own sex for the special purpose of improving the condition of these outcasts of humanity, encouraging them to return to the path of rectitude, and finding employment as a means of support. Woman's want of employment, and scanty remuneration for labour, has been a temptation, in many instances, to sacrifice her virtue.

than men are. At the same time they treat men, whom they know to be licentious, with respect and deference. With many women, licentiousness would be no obstacle in the way of entering into the most endearing bonds of companionship. Taking the libertine for their bosom companion, who had, perhaps, been the base betrayer, and more than murderer, of confiding innocence—the destroyer of the happiness of a virtuous family, and often the cause of the victim of his perfidy finding an untimely grave, and bringing down the gray hairs of aged parents with sorrow to the grave. If women love virtue, and it is right they should, why not be as fastidious that men should possess it as women? We can see no reason for this partiality, except that they wish to propitiate the "lords of creation" by censoriousness on their own sex, or it may be to make a display of their own virtue. Women contribute largely to their own degradation; and it does not raise them in the estimation of reasonable, sensible men, as much as they think.

Do not our theological teachings tend to embolden the libertine in his reckless course, and engender a low, sensual, degraded opinion of women? "Woman was naturally made subject to man, because made for him, for his use, and help, and comfort." See Comprehensive Commentary, 1 Corinth. xi. Now this opinion covers a great deal of ground, and would suit as a comment on the Alcoran; but it is wholly unfit for a comment on the pure and impartial precepts of Christianity, utterly adverse to the intellectual and moral companionship of the sexes.

The whole secret, humanly speaking, of the greater amount of moral obliquity in the male sex, in proportion to the female, lies in the distinction of the sexes, and until the entire brotherhood of the whole human family is acknowledged, it will never be otherwise-a host of evils have sprung out of this principle, and it has, like a besom of destruction, swept thousands of the male sex off the stage of action. The reason generally given, for the moral obliquity of man is, his greater exposure, but we see the same results when men and women are equally exposed before either leave their parental home. Public sentiment has tolerated these vices in man, because he is a superior being-this is the secret. We ask no indulgence for women to commit

crime, but we do ask even-handed justice to be meted out to both male and female. The world is too censorious if she transgress-too unmindful to restore her in the spirit of meekness, if she wishes to return to virtue. Are there two moral laws, one for men, and another for women?

Our aim in the discussion of this question is the profit of all, and to exert our feeble efforts to break down this partition wall, which has been erected by man's device, until we all appear as equal members of the human family, governed by the same rule of duty, the same moral law, and destined for the same endless eternity. We are aware, that our comparison of the morality of the sexes is not complimentary to one portion of the human family; although we are daily accustomed to hear it tacitly acknowledged, by the amazement and horror that is manifested in hearing of a woman committing acts that would excite no astonishment if committed by a man; and it is offered as a pretext for woman's not enjoying the same rights as man, that if she exercised the same rights as man (particularly political rights) her morals would become equally contaminated-thus acknowledging that her morals are purer than man's. We could

give many examples to show that it is admitted on all hands, that women, in the aggregate, are more moral than men, and that a purer morality is prescribed for them; still we are aware that an application of it, will not be very agreeable. Our view in writing, is not to compliment either sex, at the expense of truth. Our earnest desire is to benefit both. Man has been so long flattered that he might now afford to hear some unpalatable truth for his own profit.

Nothing short of an immediate miracle could prevent the deleterious effects of such an excess of authority in either party, as is exercised by the male part of the community, over the female, more particularly on the unscriptural principle, on which it is founded, viz., the superiority of the former, and inferiority of the latter. Superior is a term wholly unknown in the Bible, it is of man's creation, with reference to human beings. Job tells his friends, when they were exalting themselves above him, that he was not inferior to them, Job xii. 3, and xiii. 2. Paul says, "I suppose I was not a whit behind the very chiefest apostles,