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Proper Education Tor Women
PECIAL interest in the higher educa
tion of woman has a comparatively re
cent date. In the Southland, particu
larly, was the curriculum of a college
long denied her. Your own fair state
of Georgia, however, was pioneer in
opening the way for woman’s educa
tion. It was my great pleasure this
past summer to become acquainted
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with the woman who was the first to graduate from
a chartered college for women. We are proud that
a Southern woman has this distinction.
'Since it is such a new departure, there is little
wonder that many mistakes have been made in try
ing to find the proper education for women. The
old arguments against woman’s higher education
no longer hold, for she has demonstrated beyond
question that she can equal, and often excel, her
brother in mental feats and development. It is
proper, therefore, to give her equal consideration
and care in her educational demands. If any su
periority should be acceded, the woman, rather
than the man, should receive it, for the rise or fall
of women determines the destiny of the nation.
The best thought demands for woman an educa
tion not identical with man’s, perhaps, but as
thorough, as exhaustive, as far-reaching in its de
velopment of mind and heart and strength. Na
ture has fitted the two for different phases of the
great work of life, so the studies offered by a col
lege should necessarily be differentiated.
The more delicate texture of her mind catches
and holds a thousand colors that bis never sees.
Her acute sensibilities are pained, harrowed by
sights and sounds by him unnoticed; her strong
perceptive powers, with confidence born of intui
tion, grasp with rapidity what her brother strug
gles for with greatest effort.
It will be profoundly important, then, that the
subjects presented to woman in her college years
should bear at least indirectly upon the problems
that await her in the sphere to which she is called
—and by “woman’s sphere,” I mean no limitation,
but an exalted position among the affairs of life,
whose boundaries only God himself can fix. The
home-life will continue to be the noblest kingdom
of them all —’despite what pessimists and rabid un
inspired prophets may say!
So far, I have spoken of the college education
merely. And, in passing, I must admit that after
years of experience with separate and co-education,
I find the former decidedly better, even if it ne
cessitates a greater cost. The superior results over
balance the excess of expenditures. In the uni
versities, where woman’s inclination leads her, let
her feel free to choose whatever field she wishes.
Her inherent womanhood will prevent her going
to extremes.
As educators of Christian colleges we must rec
ognize that thorough college work is three-fold;
that while developing the spirit and mind, the body
must not be neglected. So a sound physical edu
cation for women certainly enters into the demands
of a properly arranged scheme of studies. The
value of a healthful body, first, possessing that
grace which comes only from an adequate phy
sique is of vital importance in creating the higher
womanhood. Develop the spiritual nature alone,
the result is a fanatic; the intellectual merely,
gives society the rascal; the physical over-develop
ed makes the brute, the pugilist, the modern ath
lete —such as some educational institutions are
sending forth.
It is rare to find a girl who is physically per
fect. Dress and mode of life have contributed
largely to deform her, even though she have no
inherited defect. I believe that this phase of edu
cation is so important that it should be on a plane
with the other branches of studies. Time is too short
just here, to outline the method most strongly ad
vocated, but my own theory is that daily out-of
door exercise, under the superintendence of a care-
J. W. "BEESON, President Meridian Eemale College.
The Golden Age for March 7, 1907.
ful director, is much better than periods twice
or thrice a week within the walls of a gymnasium.
Iln outlining the proper education of woman, we
would lay especial emphasis on the need for in
dustrial training. She should be prepared for a
life not dependent on man for a support. The
various industries now open to woman give her
vast opportunities to become a producer, side b\
side with her brother, if she so desires. She no
longer has to look to marriage as an escape from
a life of dependence and unemployed energy. She
should be so trained that if God should call her to
be queen of the home she would be well instructed
in all branches of domestic science and the art of
home-making. (She should be queen of the kitchen
as well as the drawing-room, and know thoroughly
the practical value of scientific knowledge of foods
—their composition and nutritive powers. The res
cue of the Southern people from that dyspepsia
thrust upon them by the savory, but unwholesome,
dishes prepared by the ‘‘black mammies,” must
come from trained cooks sent out by educational
institutions.
A good, practical knowledge of dressmaking,
home-nursing, home sanitation, and household
economy generally should be incorporated in the
curricula offered to women.
In so many colleges the ornamental side of life
is cultivated to the exclusion of the practical. How
to do the “society act,” to dress according to the
latest fads —whether that fad demands short
sleeves or no sleeves —to get a smattering of Eng
lish, to “parlez-vous” in a few French phrases, to
skim a few lines of Latin —in short, to do surface
work throughout—this is w’hat many colleges pass
off as “education for women.” May we awake to
the unjustness of such deceits! By the help of
the Lord we intend to do what we can to reverse
this order of things, as much as lies in our power.
We intend to prepare women for the real issues
of life.
Again, the proper education of women demands,
above all things, a solid grounding in the deep
things of God as revealed in the Holy Scriptures.
To this end there should be a department of bibli
cal instruction of equal importance with any other
department. Jesus came that we might have life,
and that we might have it more abundantly, and
this abundant life should be offered, urged upon,
every woman who enters college. Necessarily,
there muist be the proper spiritual environment
ere the Holy Spirit can have free access into the
hearts of the students.
There is one final point I wish to maintain in
the education of our girls. That is, the importance
of having them under godly teachers, and the most
careful home influences and religious surroundings.
It is important that they be as carefully protected
and guarded during the formative periods of their
lives as it is possible. In this fast age, in this
fast country, “Free America,” our young people
are living at a rapid rate, and with almost criminal
freedom. Our grandparents have been shock
times our of number, at the liberties and forward
ness of the young people of this generation. We
have little family government, except where the
children have their parents under good control. Par
ental government is at a lower ebb in America
today than in any country under the sun. As a
natural consequence of this, crime is greater in this
country per capita than in any civilized nation
on the globe, and is increasing at an alarming rate.
In Germany there are five homicides annually to
every million of population; in England and Wales
there are ten to every million; in the United States,
one hundred and thirty to every million. In twen
ty-five years the rate of homicide has become four
and one-half times greater in our country; or
where, in 1881, we killed twenty-five out of a mil
lion, in 1903, we killed one hundred and twelve
per million. On yesterday we slew twenty-five
people, today we are killing twenty-five, tomorrow
we will average twenty-five, and so on until God
himself, in some way, will terminate this ever-in
creasing avalanche of crime. In this age of for
wardness, freedom and crime, is> it not of the ut
most importance that we throw every safeguard
possible around our girls—give them the most
careful supervision and the most effectual disci
pline? The devil is fighting for our girls at every
turn. He bids for them on every corner, and
through, apparently, the most innocent ways. He
comes “as an angel of light,” as a “wolf in
sheep’s clothing,” as a devil dressed in man’s
apparel. Do not tell me that the 600,000 fallen
girls in America were all wayward, depraved girls.
They were once as pure and as sweet and as in
nocent as your beloved daughter. Satan set a
trap for them. He is setting it for your girl. He
would rather entrap the daughter of a holiness
man or woman than any one else. He is entrapping
some of them.
If they all had the safest and best surroundings
and protections during their school life, as well
as in their home life, ther would be much less work
for rescue workers to do. Fathers, mothers, let
us wake up and give better and more careful su
pervision over our daughters, and throw a greater
safeguard around them in the home and in the
school than ever before. Let us give them the
highest and best education possible along right
lines, training not only the head and hand, but the
heart as well.
Opportunity.
Master of human destinies am I,
Fame, love and fortune on my footsteps waii.
Cities and fields I walk; I penetrate
Deserts and seas remote, and passing by
Hovel and mart and palace soon or late
I knock unbidden once at every gate!
If sleeping, wake; if feasting, rise before
I turn away. It is the hour of fate,
And they who follow me reach every state
Mortals desire and conquer every foe
'Save death; but those who doubt or hesitate,
Condemned to failure, penury and woe
Seek me in vain and uselessly implore,
1 answer not, and I return no more!
—John J. Ingalls.
Opporchunity knocks at ivery man’s dure wanst.
On some men’s dures it hammers till it breaks
down th’ dure an’ thin it goes in an’ wakes him
up if he’s asleep, an’ aftherward it wurrks f’r him
as a night-watchman. On other men’s dures it
knocks and runs away, an’ on th’ dures iv some
men it knocks an’ whin they come out it hits thim
over th’ head with an ax. But ivery wan has an
opporch unity.—Mr. Dooley.
Thought He Saw Double.
A worthy professor was invited to dine at the
house of a lady of fashion.
The day was hot, the wine cool, the professor’s
thirst great, and the fair neighbor with whom the
professor was engaged in a lively conversation
filled his glass as often as it was emptied.
When the company rose from the table, the pro
fessor noticed, to his great consternation, that he
was unsteady on his feet.
In his anxiety to save appearances, he repaired
lo the drawing room, where the lady of the house
yielded to the wishes of her lady friends and or
dered the nurse to bring in the baby twins.
The pair wore lying together on a pillow, and the
nurse presented them for inspection to the person
nearest the door, who happened to be the professor.
The latter gazed intently at them for a while, an
if deciding whether or not there were two or one,
and then said, somewhat huskily:
“Really, what a bonny little child!”—People’s
Magazine.
“Whatever dims tihy sense of truth,
Or stains thy purity,
Thousrh like a* breath of summer air,
Count it as sin to thee.”
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