s women, who are one day to be wives and mothers--woman's true destiny.

Undoubtedly the special destiny of women is to be wives and mothers; but
we are told that there are thousands of women who are not and cannot be
wives and mothers. In the older and more densely settled States of the
Union, there is an excess of females over males, and all cannot get
husbands if they would. Yet, we repeat, woman was created to be a wife
and a mother, and the woman that is not fails of her special destiny.
Under the Christian dispensation honorable provision has been made for
that large class of women who, either from preference, or from any other
cause, do not marry. Virginity, which was regarded as a reproach, became
an honor under the Christian law. Those women who do not wish, or cannot
be wives and mothers in the natural order, may be both, in the spiritual
order, if they will, and are properly educated for it. They can be
wedded to the Holy Spirit, and be the mothers of minds and hearts. The
holy virgins and devout widows who consecrated themselves to God, in or
out of religious orders, are both, and fulfil in the spiritual order
their proper destiny. We hold them in high honor, because they become
mothers to the motherless, to the poor, to the forsaken, to the
homeless. They instruct the ignorant, nurse the sick, help the helpless,
tend the aged, catch the last breath of the dying, pray for the
unbelieving and the cold-hearted, and elevate the moral tone of society,
and shed a cheering radiance along the pathway of life. They have no
need to be idle or useless. In a world of so much sin and sorrow,
sickness and suffering, there is always work enough for them to do; it
is on the poor and motherless, the destitute and the downtrodden, the
sinful and the sorrowful, the aged and infirm, the ignorant and the
neglected, that, under proper direction, they can lavish the wealth of
their affections, the tenderness of their hearts, and the ardor of their
charity, and find true joy and happiness in so doing, ample scope for
woman's noblest ambition, and chances enough to acquire merit in the
sight of heaven, and true glory, that will shine brighter and brighter
forever. They thus are dear to God, dear to the Church, and dear to
Christian society. They are to be envied, not pitied. It is only because
you have lost faith in Christ, faith in the holy Catholic Church, and
have become gross in your minds, of "earth earthy," that you deplore the