OOL LIFE 69

VII.--EARLY MANHOOD 131

VIII.--THE INFLUENCE OF SISTERS 157

IX.--THE MODERN WOMAN AND HER FUTURE 170

X.--NATIONAL AND IMPERIAL ASPECTS 191

XI.--THE DYNAMIC ASPECT OF EVIL 206

CONCLUSION 221

APPENDIX 231

"No advice, no exposure, will be of use until the right relation
exists between the father and mother and their son. To deserve his
confidence, to keep it as the chief treasure committed to them by
God;--to be, the father his strength, the mother his
sanctification, and both his chosen refuge, through all weakness,
evil, danger, and amazement of his young life."

Rushkin.

THE POWER OF WOMANHOOD

CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTORY

In a banquet given in honor of Heinrik Ibsen by a Norwegian society
known as the Woman's League, in response to a speech thanking him in the
name of the society for all he had done for the cause of women, the
poet, while disclaiming the honor of having consciously worked for the
woman's cause--indeed, not even being quite clear as to what the woman's
cause really was, since in his eyes it was indistinguishable from the
cause of humanity--concluded his speech with the words:

"It has always seemed to me that the great problem is to elevate
the nation and place it on a higher level. Two factors, the man and
the woman, must co-operate for this end, and it lies especially
with the mothers of the people, by slow and strenuous work, to
arouse in it a conscious sense of culture and discipline. To the
woman, then, we must look for the solution of the problem of
humanity. It must come from them as mothers: that is the mission
that lies before them."

Whether we are admirers of the great Norwegian poet or not, whether we
are afflicted with Ibsenism, or regard his peculiar genius in a more
critical and dispassionate light, no one would deny to him that deep
intuitive insight which belongs to a poet, and which borders so closely
on the prophet's gift.

It is now some years since I have been laid aside, owing to the terrible
strain and burthen of my ten years' conflict with the evils that are
threatening the sanctity of the family, the purity of the home, and all
that constitutes the higher life of the nation. But in those ten years
the one truth that was burnt into my very soul was the t