Grudgingly,
girls have been allowed to enter the grammar and higher schools; and
here, too, by their proficiency, they have proved their right to enter.
There was a great outcry raised when the first genuine university which
admitted women, allowed them to pursue precisely the same studies as
young men. It was predicted that almost unheard-of evils would ensue.
Woman, if they succeeded, would be unfitted for her "sphere," and become
unwilling to soothe, with tender hand, the suffering and the distressed,
etc. The wail was terrific. The experiment, however, succeeded. Women
not only commenced a real collegiate course, but pursued it to the end,
graduating with honors; and, despite prophecy, college-bred women made
faithful wives, judicious mothers, and good housekeepers. A cruel war
ravaged the fair fields of a portion of the United States, bringing with
it its attendant train of misery. What was the employment of ladies who
had graduated in universities in this crisis of their country? Had their
knowledge of Latin and Greek made them either inefficient or hard? The
weary, wounded soldier in the hospitals would testify that the kind hand
of an educated and refined woman bathed his feverish temples, while her
gentle voice breathed into his ear the glad tidings of a peace to be
attained by repentance and faith in our Lord Jesus Christ.
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