haracter developed by education, she may be
obliged to enter the home of her husband's family, to be perhaps one
among many members under the same roof. In the training of her own
children, in the care of her own health and theirs, her wishes and
judgment must often yield to the prejudices of those above her, under
whose authority she is, and it may not be until many years have passed
that she will be in a position to influence in any measure the lives of
those nearest and dearest to her. Then, too, her life must be passed
entirely within the home, with no opportunities to meet or to mingle
with the great world of which she has read and studied. Surely her lot
is harder than that of the woman of the olden time, whose plain duty
always lay in the path of implicit obedience to her superiors, and who
never for one moment considered obedience to the dictates of her own
reason and conscience as an obligation higher than deference to the
wishes of husband and parents. Education, without further amelioration
of their lot as wives and mothers, can but result in making the women
discontented and unhappy,--in many cases injuring their health by worry
over the constant petty disappointments and baffled desires of their
lives.

This to superficial observers would seem a step backward rather than
forward, and it is to this cause that the present reaction against
female education may be traced. The first generation or two of educated
women must endure much for the sake of those who come after, and by many
this vicarious suffering is misunderstood, and distaste on the part of
educated girls for marriage, as it now exists in Japan, is regarded as
one of the sure signs that education is a failure. Without some change
in the position of wife and mother, this feeling will grow into absolute
repugnance, if women continue to be educated after the Western fashion.

The second remedy that is suggested is Christianity, a remedy which is
even now at work. Wherever one finds in Japan a Christian home, there
one finds the wife and mother occupying the position that she occupies
all over Christendom. The Christian man, in choosing his wife, feels
that it is not an ordinary contract, which may be dissolved at any time
at the will of the contracting parties, but that it is a union for life.
Consequently, in making his choice he is more careful, takes more time,
and thinks more of the personal qualities of the woman he is about to
marry. Thus the ch