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IV.
A SERMON OF THE PUBLIC FUNCTION OF WOMAN.—PREACHED AT THE MUSIC HALL, MARCH 27, 1853.
“That our daughters may be as corner-stones.”—Psalm cxliv. 12.
Last Sunday I spoke of the “Domestic Function of
Woman”—what she may do for the higher development
of the human race at home. To-day I ask your attention
to “A Sermon of the Ideal Public Function of Woman,
and the Economy thereof, in the higher Development
of the Human Race.”
The domestic function of woman, as a housekeeper, wife, and mother, does not exhaust her powers. Woman's function, like charity, begins at home; then, like charity, goes everywhere. To make one-half of the human race consume all their energies in the functions of housekeeper, wife, and mother, is a waste of the most precious material that God ever made.
I. In the present constitution of society there are some
unmarried women to whom the domestic function is little,
or is nothing; women who are not mothers, not wives,
not housekeepers. I mean those who are permanently
unmarried. It is a great defect in the Christian civilization,
that so many women and men are never married.
There may be three women in a thousand to whom marriage
would be disagreeable under any possible circumstances;
perhaps thirty more to whom it would be disagreeable
under the actual circumstances—in the present condition
