n our pulpits. We
want those who can make the most effective appeals to our
imaginations, our hopes and fears.

Again, as physicians. How desirable are educated women in this
profession! Give her knowledge commensurate with her natural
qualifications, and there is no position woman could assume that would
be so pre-eminently useful to her race at large, and her own sex in
particular, as that of ministering angel to the sick and afflicted; an
angel, not capable of sympathy merely, but armed with the power to
relieve suffering and prevent disease. The science of Obstetrics is a
branch of the profession which should be monopolized by woman. The
fact that it is now almost wholly in the hands of the male
practitioner, is an outrage on common decency that nothing but the
tyrant _custom_ can excuse. "From the earliest history down to 1568,
it was practiced by women. The distinguished individual first to make
the innovation on this ancient, time-sanctified custom, was no less a
personage than a court prostitute, the Duchess of Villiers, a favorite
mistress of Louis XIV. of France." This is a formidable evil, and
productive of much immorality, misery, and crime. But now that some
colleges are open to woman, and the "Female Medical College of
Pennsylvania" has been established for our sex exclusively, I hope
this custom may be abolished as speedily as possible, for no excuse
can be found for its continuance, in the want of knowledge and skill
in our own sex. It seems to me, the existence of this custom argues a
much greater want of delicacy and refinement in woman, than would the
practice of the profession by her in all its various branches.

But the great work before us is the education of those just coming on
the stage of action. Begin with the girls of _to-day_, and in twenty
years we can revolutionize this nation. The childhood of woman must be
free and untrammeled. The girl must be allowed to romp and play,
climb, skate, and swim; her clothing must be more like that of the
boy--strong, loose-fitting garments, thick boots, etc., that she may
be out at all times, and enter freely into all kinds of sports. Teach
her to go alone, by night and day, if need be, on the lonely highway,
or through the busy streets of the crowded metropolis. The manner in
which all courage and self-reliance is educated _out_ of the girl, her
path portrayed with dangers and difficulties that never exist, is
melancholy indeed. Better, far, suffer occa