“Gentles, Let Us Rest!”

(A Paper in the Nation, 1910.)

A man asked to define the essential characteristics of a gentleman—using the term in its widest sense—would presumably reply: The will to put himself in the place of others; the horror of forcing others into positions from which he himself would recoil; the power to do what seems to him right without fear of what others may say or think.

There is need just now of aid from these principles of gentility in a question of some importance—the future position of women.

The ground facts of difference between the sexes few are likely to deny:

Women are not, and in all probability never will be, physically, as strong as men.

Men are not, nor ever will be, mothers.

Women are not, and, perhaps, never should be, warriors.

To these ground facts of difference are commonly added, in argument, many others of more debatable character. But it is beside the purpose of this paper to inquire whether women have as much political sense or aptitude as men, whether a woman has ever produced a masterpiece of music, whether the brain of a woman ever weighed as much as the brain of Cuvier or Turgenev.

This paper designs to set forth one cardinal and overmastering consideration, in comparison with which all the other considerations affecting the question seem to this writer but as the little stars to the full moon.

In the lives of all nations there come moments when an idea, hitherto vaguely, almost unconsciously, held, assumes sculptured shape, and is manifestly felt to be of vital significance to a large, important, and steadily increasing section of the community. At such moments a spectre has begun to haunt the national house—a ghost which cannot be laid till it has received quietus.

Such a ghost now infests our home.

The full emancipation of women is an idea long vaguely held, but only in the last half-century formulated and pressed forward with real force and conviction, not only by women, but by men. Of this full emancipation of women, the political vote is assuredly not, as is rather commonly supposed in a land of party politics, the be-all and end-all; it is a symbol, whose practical importance—though considerable—is as nothing beside the fulfilment of the idea which it symbolizes.

The Will to Power and the Will to Love have been held up, in turn, as the animating principles of the Universe; but these are, rather, correlative half-truths, whose rivalry is surely stilled and reconciled in a yet higher principle, the Will to Harmony, to Balance, to Equity—a supreme adjustment, or harmonising power, present wherever a man turns; by which, in fact, he is conditioned, for he can with his mental apparatus no more conceive of a Universe without a Will to Equity holding it together than he can conceive the opposite of the axiom, “Ex nihilo nihil fit.” There is assuredly no thought so staggering as that, if a blade of grass or the energy contained within a single emotion were—not transmuted—but withdrawn entirely from the Universe, the balance would tip for ever and the Universe crumble in our imaginations to thin air.

Now social and political Equity emanates slowly, with infinite labour, from our dim consciousness of this serene and overlording principle of Equity. There would seem, for example, no fundamental reason why limits should ever have been put to autocracy, the open ballot destroyed, slavery abolished, save that these things came to be regarded as inequitable. In all such cases, before reaching the point of action the society of the day puts forward practical reasons, being, so to speak, unaware of its own sense of divinity. But, underneath all the seeming matter-of-factness of political and social movements, the spirit of Equity is guiding those movements, subtly, unconsciously, a compelling hand quietly pushing humanity onward, ever unseen save in the rare minutes when the spirits of men glow and light up and things are beheld for a moment as they are. The history of a nation’s spiritual development is but the tale of its wistful groping towards the provision of a machinery of State, which shall, as nearly as may be, accord with the demand of this spirit of Equity. Society, worthy of the name, is ever secretly shaping around it a temple, within which all the natural weaknesses and limitations of the dwellers shall be, not exploited and emphasized, but to the utmost levelled away and minimized. It is ever secretly providing for itself a roof under which there shall be the fullest and fairest play for all human energies, however unequal.

The destinies of mankind are seen to be guided, very slowly, by something more coherent than political opportunity; shaped steadily in a given direction towards the completion of that temple of Justice. There is no other way of explaining the growth of man from the cave-dweller to his present case. And this slow spiritual shaping towards Equity proceeds in spite of the workings of the twin bodily agents, force and expediency. Social and political growth is, in fact, a process of evolution, controlled, directed, spiritualized by the supreme principle of Equity.

This is to state no crazy creed, that because equality is mathematically admirable, equality should at all times and in all places forthwith obtain. Equality, balance, is a dream, the greatest of all visions, the beloved star—ever to be worshipped, never quite reached. And the long road towards it travels the illimitable land of compromise. It would have been futile, as it was in fact impossible, to liberate slaves, when the consciousness of the injustice of slavery was present only in a few abnormal minds, and incommunicable by them to the mind of the surrounding society of the time. The process is slow and steady. Equity well knows that there is a time for her, as for all other things. She is like the brain, saying to the limbs and senses: You are full of queer ways. It is for me to think out gradually the best rule of life, under which you must get on as you can, the Devil taking the hindmost; and from trying to devise this scheme of perfection I may not, nor ever shall, rest.

Social and political justice, then, advances by fits and starts, through ideas—children of the one great idea of Harmony—which are suggested now by one, now by another, section or phase of national life. The process is like the construction and shaping of a work of art. For an artist is ever receiving vague impressions from people unconsciously observed, from feelings unconsciously experienced, till in good time he discovers that he has an idea. This idea is but a generalization or harmonious conception derived subconsciously from these vague impressions. Being moved to embody that idea, he at once begins groping back to, and gathering in, those very types and experiences from which he derived this general notion in order adequately to shape the vehicle—his picture, his poem, his novel—which shall carry his idea forth to the world.

So in social and political progress. The exigencies and inequalities of existing social life produce a crop of impressions on certain receptive minds, which suddenly burst into flower in the form of ideas. The minds in which these abstractions or ideas have flowered seek then to burgeon them forth, and their method of doing so is to bring to public notice those exigencies and inequalities which were the original fuel of their ideas. In this way is the seed of an idea spread amongst a community. But wherever the seed of an idea falls it has to struggle up through layers of prejudice, to overcome the rule of force and expediency; and if this idea, this generalization from social exigencies or inequalities, be petty, retrograde, or distorted, it withers and dies during the struggle. If, on the other hand, it be large, consonant with the future, and of true promise, it holds fast and spreads.

Now, one may very justly say that this is all a platitudinal explanation of the crude process of social and political development. In taking a given idea, such as the full emancipation of women, the fight only begins to rage round the question whether that idea is in fact holding fast and spreading, and, if so, whether the community is, or is not, yet sufficiently permeated with the idea to be safely entrusted with its fulfilment. None the less must it be borne in mind that if this idea can be proved to be surely spreading, it must be an idea emanating from the root divinity in things, from the overmastering principle of Equity, and sure of ultimate fulfilment; and the only question will then be, exactly how long the rule of expediency and force may advisably postpone its fulfilment.

Now, in order to discover whether the idea of the full emanicipation of women is in accord with the great principle of Equity, it will be necessary, first, to show the present inferiority of woman’s political and social position; secondly, to consider the essential reason of that inferiority; and, thirdly, to see whether the facts and figures of the movement towards the removal of that inferiority clearly prove that the idea has long been holding fast and spreading.

To show, however, that the present political and social position of women is not equal to that of men, it will certainly suffice to state two admitted facts. Women have not the political vote. Women, who can be divorced for one offence, must, before they obtain divorce, prove two kinds of offence against their husbands.

And to ascertain the essential reason of this present inferiority we need hardly go beyond the ground facts of difference between men and women already mentioned:

Women are not physically as strong as men.

Men are never mothers.

Women are not warriors.

From these ground facts, readily admitted by all, the reason for the present inferiority of women’s position emerges clear and unmistakable. Women are weaker than men. They are weaker because they are not in general built so strongly; because they have to bear and to rear children; because they are unarmed. There is no getting away from it, they are weaker; and one cannot doubt for a moment that their inferior position is due to this weakness. But—so runs an immemorial argument—however equal their opportunities might be, women will never be as strong as men! Why then, for sentimental reasons, disturb the present order of things, why equalize those opportunities? This is the plea which was used before married women were allowed separate property, before the decision in “Regina versus Jackson,” which forbade a husband to hold his wife prisoner. The argument, in fact, of expediency and force.

Now there are no finer statements of the case for the full emancipation of women than Mill’s “Subjection of Women,” and Miss Jane Harrison’s essay entitled “Homo Sum.” The reasonings in the former work are too well-known, but to the main thesis of “Homo Sum” allusion must here be made. The most common, perhaps most telling, plea against raising the social and political status of women to a level with that of men is this: Men and women are already equal, but in separate spheres of activity. The difference between their physical conformation and functions underlies everything in the lives of both. The province and supremacy of women are in the home; the province and supremacy of men in the State. Why seek to alter what Nature has ordained? A plea, in fact, which glorifies sex qua sex.

But the writer of “Homo Sum” is at pains to show that “the splendid and vital instinct of sex,” with all its “singular power of interpenetrating and reinforcing other energies,” is in essence egoistic, exclusive, anti-social; and that, besides and beyond being men and women, we are all human beings. “The whole women’s movement,” the writer says, “is just the learning of that lesson. It is not an attempt to arrogate man’s prerogative of manhood; it is not even an attempt to assert and emphasize woman’s privilege of womanhood; it is simply the demand that in the life of woman, as in the life of man, space and liberty shall be found for a thing bigger than either manhood or womanhood—for humanity.”

In fact the splendid instinct of sex—for all its universality, for all that through and by it life is perpetuated, for all its power of bringing delight, and of revealing the heights and depths of human emotion—is still essentially an agent of the rule of force. We cannot but perceive that there is in both men and women something more exalted and impersonal, akin to the supreme principle of Equity, to the divinity in things; and that this something keeps men and women together, as strongly, as inevitably, as sex keeps them apart. What is all the effort of civilization but the gradual fortifying of that higher part of us—the exaltation of the principle of Justice, the chaining of the principle of Force? The full emancipation of women would be one more step in the march of our civilization—a sign that this nation was still serving humanity, still trying to be gentle and just. For if it has ceased to serve humanity, we must surely pray that the waters may rise over this island, and that she may go down all standing!

If, then, women’s position is inferior to men’s, if the essential reason of this inferiority is her weakness, or, in other words, the still unchecked dominance of force, to what extent do the facts and figures of the movement towards removing the inferiority of women’s position prove that the idea of the full emancipation of women is, not petty and false, withering and dying, but large and true, holding fast and spreading?

In 1866, a petition for the vote, signed by 1,499 women, was presented to Parliament by John Stuart Mill.

In 1873, petitions for the suffrage from 11,000 women were presented to Gladstone and Disraeli.

In 1896, an appeal was made to members of Parliament by 257,000 women of all classes and parties.

In 1897, 1,285 petitions in favour of a Women’s Suffrage Bill were presented to Parliament, being 800 more petitions than those presented in favour of any other Bill.

In 1867, Mill’s amendment to substitute “person” for “man” in the Representation of the People Act was rejected by a majority of 121.

In 1908, Stanger’s Bill to enable women to vote on the same terms as men passed its second reading by a majority of 179.

In 1893, 1894, and 1895, the franchise was granted to women in New Zealand, Colorado, South Australia, and Utah.

In 1900, 1902, 1903, 1905, 1908, and 1910, the franchise was granted to women in Western Australia, New South Wales, Tasmania, Finland, Norway, Victoria, and the State of Washington.

In 1902, a petition was signed by 750 women graduates.

In 1906, a petition was signed by 1,530 women graduates.

In 1910, the membership of the various Women’s Suffrage Societies, and of bodies of men and women who have declared in favour of the idea of women’s suffrage, is estimated by some at over half a million—a figure subject, no doubt, to great deduction; but certainly also to very great addition for sympathisers who belong to no such societies or bodies.

These, briefly, are the main facts and figures. From them but one conclusion can be drawn. The idea of the full emancipation of women having fulfilled the requirements of steady growth over a long space of years, and giving every promise of further steady growth, is in accord with the principle of Equity; intrinsically just. How long will it remain possible in the service of expediency and force to refuse to this idea its complete fruition; how long will it be wise? For when the limit of wisdom is reached, expediency has obviously become inexpedient and force unworthy.

When out of 670 members of a House of Commons 400 have given pledges to support women’s suffrage; when a measure for the enfranchisement of women on the same terms as men has passed its second reading by a majority of 179, and in face of this declaration of sentiment Government has refused to afford facilities for carrying it into law, there must obviously be some definite hostile factor in the political equation. In a country governed as ours is, it is but natural that those who are, so to speak, trustees for its policy, should not look with favour on any measure which may in their opinion definitely set back that policy, or affect it in some way which they cannot with sufficient clearness foresee. The cause of women, in fact, is a lost dog owned by neither party, distrusted by both. While there is yet danger of being bitten, each watches that dog carefully, holding out a more or less friendly hand. But when the door of the house is safely closed, she may howl her heart out in the cold. The Press, too, with few exceptions is committed to one or other of these parties. To the Press, also, then, the cause of women is a homeless wanderer to whom it is proper to give casual alms, but who can hardly be brought in to the fire, lest she take up the room of the children of the house. And so out of the despair caused by this lost drifting in a vicious circle, out of a position created by party expediency, the inevitable has come to pass. Militant suffragism has arisen—ironically, and, to my thinking, regrettably, since the real spiritual significance and true national benefit of the full emancipation of women will lie in the victory of justice over force; and to employ what must needs be inferior force to achieve the victory of justice over force is not only futile, but so befogging to the whole matter that the essential issue of Equity is more than ever hidden from the mind of the public. Militancy may have served certain purposes, but it has added one more element of fixity to an impasse already existing, for the woman of action is saying, “Until you give me the vote I shall act like this,” and the man of action is answering her, “So long as you act like that I shall not give you the vote. To yield to you would be to admit the efficacy of threats and establish a bad precedent.”

None the less, human nature being what it is, militancy was inevitable, and the wise will look at the situation, not as it was, or might be, but as it is. We must consider what effect that situation is having on the national character. Every little outrage committed on men by women is met by a little outrage committed on women by men; and each time one of these mutual outrages takes place, tens of thousands of minds in this country are blunted in that most sensitive quality, gentleness. It is idle to pretend that women have not stood, and do not still stand, to men as the chief reason for being gentle; that men have not, and do not still stand to women, in the same capacity. By every little mutual outrage, then, the beneficence of sex is being weakened, its maleficence awakened throughout the land. And the harm which is thus being done is so impalpable, so subtle, as to be beyond the power of most to notice at all, and surely beyond the power of statesmen to assess. That is the mischief. The scent is stealing away out of the flower of our urbanity. It will be long before the gardeners discover how odourless and arid that flower has become.

For it is not so much the action of the militant women themselves, nor that of those who are suppressing them, which is doing this subtle harm. It is the effect of this scrimmage on the spectators; the coarsening, and hardening, and general embitterment; the secret glorification of the worst side of the sex instinct; the constant exaltation of the rule of force; the rapid growth of a rankling sense of injustice amongst tens of thousands of women. To say that hundreds of thousands of women are opposed, or indifferent, to the full emancipation of their sex is not, in truth, to say very much. No civilizing movement was ever brought to fruition save in the face of the indifference or opposition of the majority. What proportion of agricultural labourers were actively concerned to win for themselves the vote? How small a fraction of the people actively demanded free education! But when these privileges were won, what number of those for whom they were won would have been willing to resign them? If women were fully emancipated to-morrow, many would certainly resent what they would deem a blow at the influence and power already wielded by them in virtue of their sex. But in two years’ time how many would be willing to surrender their freedom? As certainly, not ten in a hundred! To compare the disapproval of women raised against their wills to a state of emancipation in which they can remain inactive if they like with the bitter resentment spreading like slow poison in the veins of those who fruitlessly demand emancipation is to compare the energy of vanishing winter snow with that of the spring sun which melts it.

In an age when spirituality has ever a more desperate struggle to maintain hold at all against the inroads of materialism, any increase of bitterness in the national life, any loss of gentleness, aspiration, and mutual trust between the sexes, however silent, secret, and unmeasurable, is, surely, a serious thing. Justice, neglected, works her own insidious revenge. Every month, every year, the germs of bitterness and brutality will be spreading. If any think that this people has gentleness to spare, and can afford to tamper with the health of its spirit, they are mistaken. If any think that repression can put an end to this aspiration—again they are mistaken. The idea of the full emancipation of women is so rooted that nothing can now uproot it.

But, apart from the political impasse, there are those who, satisfied that women have not the political aptitude of men, are chiefly opposed to the granting of the vote for fear that it will come to mean the return of women to Parliament. Now, if their conviction regarding the inferiority of women’s political capacity be sound—as I for one, speaking generally, am inclined to believe—there is no danger of women being returned to Parliament save in such small numbers as to make no matter. If it be unsound—if the political capacity of woman be equal to man’s—it is time Parliament were reinforced by women’s presence. New waters soon find their level. Nor are such as distrust the political capacities of women qualified to prophesy a flood. To debar women for fear of their competition is a policy of little spirit, and not one that the men of this country will consciously adopt, unless we have indeed lost the fire of our fathers. There are many, too, who believe that the granting of the vote to women will increase the emotional element in an electorate whose emotional side they already distrust, and thereby endanger our relations with foreign Powers. But it has yet to be proved that women are, in a wide sense of the word, more emotional than men; and, even conceding that they are, why forget that they will bring to the consideration of international matters the solid reinforcement of two qualities—the first, a practical domestic sense lacking to men, and likely to foster national reluctance to plunge into wild-cat wars, the second, a greater faculty for self-sacrifice, tending to fortify national determination to persist in a war once undertaken. It is well known that during the American Civil War the women of the Southern States displayed a spirit of resistance even more heroic than that of their men folk. But, in any case, to retain women in their present state of social and political inferiority for reasons which are so debatable savours, surely, somewhat of the sultanic. We have, in fact, yet to imbibe the spirit of Mill’s wisest saying: “Amongst all the lessons which men require for carrying on the struggle against the evident imperfections of their lot on earth, there is no lesson which they more need than not to add to the evils which Nature inflicts, by their jealous and prejudiced restrictions on one another.”

In fine, out of the practical perplexities brooding over this whole matter there is no way save by resort to the first principles of gentility. It has been uncontrovertibly established that there is in this country a great and ever-increasing body of women suffering from a bitter sense of injustice. What course then, compatible with true gentility, is left open to us men? Our whole social life is in essence but a long, slow, striving for the victory of justice over force; and this demand of our women for full emancipation is but a sign of that striving. Are we not bound in honour to admit this simple fact? Shall we not at last give fulfilment to this idea—with the due caution that should mark all political experiment? Has not, in truth, the time come for us to say: From this resistance to the claims of Equity; from this bitter and ungracious conflict with those weaker than ourselves; from this slow poisoning of the well-springs of our national courtesy, and kindliness, and sense of fair play: “Gentles, let us rest!”