It must be granted that this line of argument in Burke's case led to a fatal blindness to obvious injustice and to a curious inability to appreciate what was good, noble and disinterested in the leaders of the revolutionary movement. Mary Wollstonecraft and her friends failed to see that reforms which are to affect the roots of existing conditions—however desirable and even necessary—must of necessity be slow and gradual, lest our gain should prove but a poor substitute for our certain loss. There are none more dangerous to society than the abstract idealist, whose very inexperience confirms him in the belief that he is in possession of absolute Truth, for which he is willing to lay down his own life, and,en passant, the lives of others. Of such a nature was the "amiable defect"—to use her own terminology—developed in Mary Wollstonecraft's nature by too impulsive a zeal in the cause of mankind.
She felt intensely on the subject. The furious onslaught which she makes upon Burke in theRights of Man—without that respect for grey hairs which she would have Burke observe in his dealings with Dr. Price—was prompted by a far deeper feeling for mankind than Burke was capable of. The two vulnerable points in Burke's pamphlet were his unreasonable vehemence and the personal character of his attacks on the one hand, and his want of real sympathy with the "swinish multitude" on the other. The submerged portions of humanity have little to hope for in a statesman who coolly advises them "by labour to obtain what by labour can be obtained and to be taught their consolation in the final proportions of eternal justice". The hopeless conservatism of this view aroused the indignation of Mary Wollstonecraft. "It is possible," she exclaims, "to render the poor happier in this world without depriving them of the consolation which you gratuitously grant them in the next!"
Nor has Mr. Burke's "immaculate constitution" her undivided sympathy. She agrees with Rousseau that property, while one of the pillars of the monarchical system, is a deadly enemy to that equalityof men before the law without which there can be no real liberty. The preservation of the intact family-estate for the purpose of perpetuating a time-honoured name and tradition, much as it appeals to Burke, was a phrase the force of which did not strike Mary Wollstonecraft, whose indifference to opinion we have already referred to. It would be far better for society if each large estate were divided into a number of small farms, so that each might have a competent portion and all amassing of property cease.
In the same passage she boldly asserts the rights of man, as laid down by Rousseau in his famous Social Compact, which give him a title to as much liberty, both civil and religious, as is compatible with the rights of every other individual. As it is, the first rule of the doctrine of equality, which says that all men are equal before the law, is utterly disregarded, for does not the law shield the rich and oppress the poor? Property in England is a great deal more secure than liberty.
The views expressed in the above passage to a great extent anticipate those of Godwin's "Caleb Williams", published in 1794, which, according to the author's preface, comprehended "a general view of the modes of domestic and unrecorded despotism by which man becomes the destroyer of man", and in which a social system was denounced which enabled the rich man to use the power of a law which seemed to regard only the interests of one single class of society for the most nefarious purposes[43]. A parallel to this sociological novel is afforded by Mary Wollstonecraft's unfinished "Maria, or the Wrongs of Woman", to which, if we replace the last word by "woman", the sentence just quoted applies literally.
It is but fair to state that Mary Wollstonecraft did not persist in her extreme views as to the necessity of a sudden and radical change which at one time made her overlook the principle of slow evolution. She was willing to recognise this principle in her "Historical and Moral View of the Origin and Progress of the French Revolution", of which the first and only volume was written some three years later. At Paris, before her intimacy with Imlay and the birth of her daughter Fanny brought about a temporary relaxation in her social zeal, her time was spent in watching the development of events with eager and sympathetic interest. Her optimistic faith in the perfectibilityof mankind helped her—as it did Wordsworth—to look beyond the horrors and bloodshed by which her heart was moved to intense pity and indignation. She was convinced that out of the chaotic mass "a fairer government was rising than ever shed the sweets of social life on the world." But, she adds, "things must have time to find their level."
The "Vindication of the Rights of Man"—although quite overshadowed by Paine's pamphlet—met with so much success that very soon after its publication a second edition was called for. There is no doubt that this circumstance gave Mary a great deal of encouragement. It became an incentive to further efforts on a larger scale in the direction in which she now realised lay the mission of her life. In spite of her theories she was sufficiently sensitive to praise to feel gratified by it and to derive from it the moral courage necessary to defy public opinion and constitute herself the champion of the Cause of Woman.
We have seen that the Cause of Woman had met with very little regard in England in the course of the century, except where moral improvement was concerned. In France, however, the progress to be recorded was considerable. It will be remembered that Fénelon had been the first to insist on an education which might teach girls the pursuit of some useful ideal instead of leaving them to pass their time in a degrading search for pleasure. There is in Fénelon a distinct foreshadowing of the tendencies of educational reform in later years. With Mary Wollstonecraft also, the chief aim of education is not to prepare the individual for social intercourse, but to accustom the mind to listen to the dictates of Reason. Fénelon has a more negative way of putting the question. He believes in filling the mind with useful ideas as a means of preventing moral degradation.
In the course of the following century, the philosophers of the Encyclopédie introduced their theories of rationalism. Helvétius (in hisTraité de l'Homme, 1774) insisted on the necessity of an education in connection with his theory that the human mind, which is sovereign, is the exclusive product of education and experience. He may be called a link in the chain of advocates of the Cause of Woman, although not paying the slightest attention to women in particular; for he indirectly advances their cause a step by defending the view that an education is indispensable to develop the mind and thus attain perfection. He is one of the originators of the theory which says that the mind is in a perfectly neutral state at birth, capable of receiving and guarding any impressions which may be produced byaccidental circumstances, which a well-regulated education may to a certain extent make or re-make; the obvious conclusion being that all men are of equal birth. To this scheme Diderot in his "Réfutation" opposed his theory of heredity, or innate character. Both Godwin and Mary Wollstonecraft were adherents of Helvétius. Viewed in the light of original equality, which supposes equal possibilities in individuals who are only physically different, it will be readily seen what a long vista of improvements may be opened by perfecting the education.
In the catalogue Rousseau must be passed over until Mary herself will introduce him, when he will be fighting on the wrong side, although not so completely as Mary Wollstonecraft would have us believe. Although their respective views on the subject of female education and the consequent position of women in society are almost diametrically opposed, yet there is a great deal of sound reasoning in the remarks of both. However, we find in each the same unfortunate tendency to generalisation and exaggeration.
A discussion of the social position of women without direct reference to education, criticising them as they then were, and pointing out what they might be, may be found in d'Holbach'sSocial System(1774), where an entire chapter is devoted to the subject. Mr. Brailsford[44]points out the strange incongruity which lies in the fact that an atheist and a confirmed materialist was among the first to recommend the emancipation of women. For a rationalist philosopher, indeed, to arrive at the conclusion that women should be made the social equals of men, would be nothing very remarkable, but where d'Holbach constantly keeps in view the moral side of the problem, he approaches the English moralists rather than the French thinkers of the school of Reason.
The tone of his plea is sincere, and his hints are wise, moderate and worthy of consideration. He complains that the education of the women of his time, instead of developing in them those qualities which are best calculated to bring happiness to men, merely tends to make them inconstant, capricious and irresponsible. They are being tyrannised over in every country; in Europe their position is not more enviable than elsewhere, although a varnish of gallantry seeks to hide the fact. Not woman herself is to blame for this, but rather man, who refuses her the benefit of an education which may renderher fit to perform the duties of life. There is nothing more inconsistent than the education of girls, which includes instruction in religious matters, teaching them the hope of eternity in conjunction with all the vanities of life, such as dancing and a too great regard for dress and deportment, which are incompatible with true piety.
D'Holbach was also the first to protest against those marriages in which even mutual esteem is wanting, which is even more important than love, because of its greater permanence. Where conjugal infidelity is encouraged on the stage and in society, married life too often becomes one protracted intrigue, and the domestic duties and the education of the children cease to be regarded. Women of the lower classes are even worse off; prostitution is their only course, and society, while readily forgiving the seducer, leaves the victim to a life of infamy.
The chapter ends with an earnest appeal to women to learn the value of reason and the power of virtue, which alone lead to happiness, and to respect themselves if they wish others to respect them.
The parallelism between the passages referred to above and the main drift of Mary Wollstonecraft's contentions in her "Vindication of the Rights of Women" is so particularly striking, that the assumption seems justified that she had read d'Holbach.
The outbreak of the revolution caused the new philosophical principles to be put to the test of practical experiment. In 1791 the National Assembly, realising that an important step towards the realisation of that equality they aimed at was the institution of a national education, called upon Talleyrand to elaborate a project of an educational scheme on rational principles. Talleyrand's report pointed out the desirability of allowing women to share in the universal education and to establish schools to which both sexes were to be admitted. As regards the possibility of their taking part in political discussions, he was of opinion that their domestic duties forbade their entering the arena of politics. The education of children was the principal of these duties, and the report says that "after reaching the age of eight, girls should be restored to their parents to be taught housekeeping at home."
The dissolution of the National Assembly caused Talleyrand's scheme to be consigned to oblivion, and his task was entrusted by the Legislative Assembly to the philosopher Condorcet. This disciple of Turgot, who may be called the French Godwin, sharing the latter's love of the mathematics of philosophy, blessed with the same boundless confidence in the future of humanity, and actuated by the sameunselfish enthusiasm, which he did not, like Godwin, take the trouble to hide under a mask of seeming Stoicism,—read his report in April 1792. It almost coincided with the publication of theVindication, for a letter written by Mrs. Bishop to Everina Wollstonecraft in July of the same year refers to Mary as the successful author of theRights of Women. Condorcet's views differ from Mary's in that he wishes the instruction which is open to all classes to be regulated in accordance with talent and capacity. An education, therefore, regarding innate talents rather than social distinctions, and by which each man is to be rendered independent of others[45].
Women are to receive the same instruction as men. It is not astonishing that the theorist Condorcet should be inclined to go beyond what the practical Talleyrand considered feasible and to forget the undeniable difference in character and capacities existing between the sexes. In this, Mary Wollstonecraft felt like Condorcet. Both make the mistake, when anxious to assert the intellectual equality of women and to have them recognised as "partakers of Reason", of trying to strengthen their plea by pointing to one or two exceptional women to prove what woman is capable of. The grounds on which Condorcet—continuing the line of thought of his French predecessors—demands instruction for women are the same as those of Mary. Women are the natural educators of the young, they should guard their husbands' affections by making themselves agreeable companions, capable of taking an interest in their daily occupations. But it is the last argument that clinches matters: the two sexes have equalrightsto be instructed.
It is Condorcet's ideal—as it had been that of Bernardin de St. Pierre—to give the children of the two sexes a joint education, which may prepare them for the social state, and which he feels confident will remove the atmosphere of unhealthy mystery which an artificial separation is apt to produce. Mary heartily concurs with this view. "I should not," she says, "fear any other consequence than that some early attachment might take place, which, whilst it had the best effect on the moral character of the young people, might not perfectly agree with the views of the parents."
I have tried to point out that, although the acquaintance of Mary Wollstonecraft with the works of the French educationalists (Rousseau,of course, excepted) is doubtful, yet there is the closest resemblance in the spirit which animates them. The English writers on the subject, as we have seen, were upon the whole much less enlightened. Their names are repeatedly mentioned in theVindication, and their methods criticised. The principles underlying the theory of the Rights of Man are adopted with perfect logic as a basis on which to consider the position of the female half of society. "If the abstract rights of man will bear discussion and explanation", says the dedication to Talleyrand, in whom she trusted to find a sympathiser, "those of woman, by a parity of reasoning, will not shrink from the same test."
Mary's methods of investigation are borrowed from Rousseau. In his scheme for the improvement of social conditions, the latter had insisted on the necessity of reverting to the original principles which underlie the social structure, and out of the misunderstanding and consequent misapplication of which the great hindrances to human progress, prejudice and prescription arose. A too close regard to expediency—continually contrasted with simple principles—seems to her the cause of the introduction of measures "rotten at the core", from which flow the misery and disorder which pervade society. While adopting Rousseau's general lines of thought, however, she cannot bring herself to share his raptures about the state of nature, which in its essence is nothing but a denial of the possibility of a well-organised society. The optimism with which he regards the individual does not extend to society, in respect to which he is far too pessimistic to suit Mary's unshakable confidence in human perfectibility. Where Rousseau asserts that "l'homme est né bon", and holds the social state responsible for the introduction of evil, Mary Wollstonecraft feels in the presence of evil the will of the Almighty that we should make use of the gift of Reason as a means of conquering evil and attaining perfection. To return to Nature, therefore, would mean evading the chief task which God meant to impose upon his favourite creature, that of cultivating virtue in the social state which He ordained.
Here again, as in Helvétius, d'Holbach and so many others, Reason is to be the governing power. In Reason lies Man's pre-eminence over the brute creation, and out of the struggle between Reason and the passions arise virtue and knowledge, by which man is conducted towards happiness. Mary Wollstonecraft, in bringing her reason to bear upon the existing social conditions, had become deeply conscious of the degrading position of her sex, and, having herself risen above hertroubles, makes a fervent appeal to rational men to give them a chance of becoming more respectable. Her plea, while in the first place for her sex, embraces all humanity, for unless woman be prepared by education to become the companion of man rather than his mistress, she will hamper the progress of knowledge and virtue.
There seems, indeed, a great deal of absurdity in a social scheme which in vindicating the rights of the male portion of humanity, in claiming for them equality, liberty and the blessings of education, could leave the other half of mankind out of consideration. Was liberty to be the portion of men only; and was woman to continue in her state of bondage? Were all men to be partakers of Reason, guided by her only, whilst women had the use of that faculty denied them? In a social state where such partiality could prevail, man was himself responsible for the utter depravity of women. The worst despotism is not that of kings, but that of man, and woman is the trampled-upon victim.
We are thus led to a natural division of the subject into an examination of the position of woman such as it is, and an investigation of what it ought to be and might be. There is one circumstance which distinguishes Mary Wollstonecraft from other champions of the new social creed. In their eagerness to champion oppressed humanity against all forms of tyranny and oppression, Thomas Paine and his followers had been too much inclined to forget that "every right necessarily includes a duty." It is very much to Mary's credit that she emphatically pointed out that "they forfeit the right who do not fulfil the duty." In her claims for equality with men, far from being prompted by sordid motives of envy, or by a desire to obtain power or influence for her sex, she aims at enabling women to discharge the duties of womanhood, among which that of educating their own children occupies the first place. She was always ready herself to take more than her share of those duties, and no one at present doubts her sincerity when saying that she pleads for her sex rather than for herself.
In considering the actual position of women in society she concludes that the trouble arises from two widely different sources. Women have either too much attention paid them, or they have no attention whatever paid them, and the result is equally disastrous, although in a different way. She had had personal experience of the defencelessness and helplessness of a young woman whom fate had cast out upon the cruel world without the means of fighting adverse circumstances,when financial embarrassments forced her to accept a situation as governess in Lord Kingsborough's home. It had stung her to the quick to realise the contempt in which she was held by those whom she justly considered her intellectual inferiors, merely because no government had ever taken the trouble to provide for women without a natural protector, and the narrow views of society were that any woman who, compelled by circumstances, tried to support herself in an honest profession, degraded herself. That her only alternative was to throw herself upon the protection of some lord of creation and prostitute herself, did not seem to occur to these judges of morality. The only compassion excited by the helplessness of females was the consequence of personal attractions, making pity "the harbinger of lust."
It is the duty of a benevolent government to add to the respectability of women by enabling them to earn their own bread, and to save them from inevitable prostitution, or from the degradation of marrying for support. Let the professions be thrown open to them, let women study to become physicians and nurses. Let there be midwives rather than "accoucheurs", let them study history and politics, all of which will keep them far better employed than the perusal of romances or "chronicling small beer". Women are capable of taking a share in the dealings of trade, of regulating a farm, or of managing a shop. The only employments which have hitherto been open to them are of a menial kind. Thus the position of a governess, who must be a gentlewoman to be equal to her important task of education, is held in less repute than that of a tutor, who is himself treated as a dependant. This prejudice entirely destroys the aim of tutorship in rendering him contemptible to his pupils.
How the personal note appears in the above remarks, the demands of which will certainly not strike the modern reader as exorbitant. However, seen in the light of the prejudices prevailing in Mary's days, they make her stand out very clearly from the common herd of those who were willing slaves to man. She seconds Condorcet in hinting at the remote possibility of having female representatives in Parliament. It may here be argued in favour of her modest proposal—which she fears may excite laughter—that the introduction of women into the Parliament of those days could not very well have made matters worse than they were. The mock representation of the "rotten boroughs" was indeed as she calls it "a handle for despotism"of the worst description, and on this subject at least a large portion of the nation held coinciding views.
The position of women of the upper classes, who have every attention paid them and pass their lives in search of amusement, although it seems better, is in reality even worse. In connection with his views on this subject Mary is reluctantly obliged to recognise in Rousseau—whose inconsistency is among his chief characteristics—a champion of despotism. Making allowance for a few deviations in details of education, it may be said that here Rousseau's views reflect the general opinion of his time. His educational scheme, which upon the whole had Mary's sympathy, and from which she borrowed largely in her purely educational works, only regards Emile, the boy. The girl, Sophie, only interests him as being essential to the happiness of the male. The theory that the education of women should be "relative to men", as Rousseau puts it, places him in direct opposition to Mary Wollstonecraft, as it implies a necessary inferiority on the part of women. His maxims supply her with a target against which to direct the shafts of her disapprobation and indignation. In his "Lettre à d'Alembert" he had made a violent onslaught on women and the passion they inspire. It does not leave them a shred of reputation: modesty, purity and decency are said to have completely forsaken them. The hysterical violence of his sallies was probably due to his hatred of the Encyclopedians, those "philosophers of a day" whose rationalism opposed the utter subjection of women to man's desires. I have already pointed out that it was from the French school of rationalism that the first suggestions of emancipation came, and the above-mentioned epistle marks the beginning of hostilities between the rationalist and the emotional school.
Mary Wollstonecraft did not find it difficult to agree with Rousseau that many women had sunk to a state of deep degradation, but, she asked: "A qui la faute?" It was man who brought her there, and she expected man to lift her on to a more exalted plane.
The Julie of Rousseau's "Nouvelle Héloise" impresses us as another inconsistency. She displays, it is true, the characteristic submissiveness to a characteristically masterful parent, and the usual notions of virtue consisting chiefly in the preservation of reputation which Mary attacks so vigorously in theRights of Women, but Julie has far more individuality than the average young woman of the period. She rather leads her lover than he her. TheNouvelle Héloise, however, displays Rousseau's sentimental vein, and is therefore more directlyirrational than anything else he wrote. The Sophie ofEmileis partly the creation of his intellect, the Julie of theNouvelle Héloisealmost exclusively that of his sentiment.
In the fifth book ofEmile, therefore, sentimentality only plays an occasional part. Rousseau's intellect assigns to woman the place which she ought to fill in society. A writer on female education, says Lord John Morley, may consider woman as destined to be a wife, or a mother, or a human being; as the companion of man, as the rearer of the young, or as an independent personality, endowed with talents and possibilities in less or greater number, and capable as in the case of men of being trained to the best or the worst use, or left to rust unused[46]. Rousseau insists upon the first, makes little of the second, and utterly ignores the third. Emile is brought up to be above all a man; Sophie, however, is given no chance of attaining the necessary qualifications for womanhood and motherhood and is merely educated to be an obedient and submissive companion to her husband. Her opinions are modelled upon Emile's, and in no matter of importance, not even in religion, is she allowed to choose for herself. The last is an emphatic denial of the faculty of Reason in women. That a woman of this stamp, accustomed to mental and moral dependence, is all unfit to educate her own children, is self-evident, nor did Rousseau destine her for this task. As soon as the child has been weaned, the mother passes out of the educational scheme, her place and that of the father being taken by the instructor.
Mary Wollstonecraft regards women in the first place as human beings and asserts their right to be educated. They are in possession of the faculty of Reason, which in them is as capable of being perfected as in their lord and master, man. Their conduct and manners, however, show that their minds are in no healthy state. Having been taught that their chief aim in life is to make a wealthy marriage, they sacrifice everything to beauty and attractiveness of appearance. Instead of cherishing nobler ambitions, they are satisfied to remain in that state of perpetual childhood in which the tyranny of man has purposely kept them. The relative education has made them utterly dependent on masculine opinion. Rousseau, who calls opinion the tomb of virtue in men, recommends it to women as its "high throne", thus introducing a sexual code of morality. They know that the flattering sense of physical superiority makes man prefer them feeble and clingingfor protection, and accordingly they cultivate physical weakness and dependence. A puny appetite is considered by them "the height of human perfection". Why did not Rousseau extend his excellent advice regarding outdoor sports and games to girls? They would not care for dolls if their involuntary confinement within doors did not incapacitate them from healthier pursuits. Thus the physical inferiority of women is partly of man's own creation, and might be to a large extent remedied.
Once the right of being educated has been granted to women, they must of necessity develop into suitable companions to their husbands and affectionate parents to their children. To assert that woman's only duty consists in catering for the happiness of her lord and master is taking a sordid view of her possibilities. Granting that woman has a soul, and that the promise of immortality applies also to her, it follows naturally that the cultivation of that soul is her chief business in life. The prevailing notion of a sexual character, therefore, is subversive of all morality. Soldiers, who like women are sent into the world before their minds have been stored with knowledge or fortified by principles, show the same deplorable lack of common sense.
Scattered through the book are a number of rather desultory remarks from which may be gathered the author's notions regarding the baleful influence of slavery upon the moral aspirations of her sex. Nearly all contemporary authors agreed that woman's chief aim ought to be "to please". Among their number were Mrs. Barbauld, Mrs. Piozzi, Mme de Genlis and Mme de Staël. From the first the notion was inculcated that the chief object is to make an advantageous match, "it is acknowledged that they spend many of the first years of their lives in acquiring a smattering of accomplishments, meanwhile strength of mind and body are sacrificed to libertine notions of beauty, to the desire of establishing themselves—the only way women can rise in the world—by marriage."
The cardinal virtues of the sex are therefore those qualities which are best calculated to make them acceptable to men, as gentleness, sweetness of temper, docility and a "spaniel-like" affection. Men complain, and with reason, of the follies and caprices of women, forgetting that they are the natural outcome of an ignorance which is very far removed from innocence.
The education of women, such as it is, consists only in some kind of preparation for social life, instead of being considered the first step to form a rational being, advancing by gradual steps towardsperfection. Thus a woman is methodically prepared for the bondage that awaits her, and never gets an opportunity of asserting her better possibilities. A sexual character is established by artificial means, and in this circumstance Mary sees the chief cause of woman's moral decay, for which she herself is only partly responsible.
All her life she remains powerless to get away from the shackles of first impressions. Her conduct is regulated by absurd notions of a specially feminine virtue, chastity, modesty and propriety. Instead of realising that virtue—which surely ought to be the same for women as for men—is nothing but love of truth and fortitude, she confounds with it reputation. Respect for the opinion of the world is considered one of her chief duties, for does not Rousseau himself declare that reputation is no less indispensable than chastity?
For true modesty—which is only that purity of thought which is characteristic of cultivated minds—she substitutes the coquettish affectations which are to draw the lover on while seemingly rejecting him. The insincerity of these principles of daily conduct tend to develop in the female mind that cunning which Rousseau calls natural and accordingly recommends! For a woman to show her actual feelings is to be guilty of the most flagrant breach of modesty.
Where writers have granted to man the monopoly of reason, they have given to woman as a substitute that which is delicately termed "sensibility", but is in reality nothing but a morbid sort of sensuality, the consequence of devouring novels which have the effect of inflaming the senses, and the only antidote to which is healthy exercise.
Mary Wollstonecraft, like the Bluestocking moralists, regarded the quality of sensibility with favour only when regulated by Reason. In her enjoyment of the beauty of natural scenery, according to her own analysis, it is her very reason which "obliged her to permit her feelings to be her criterion." (Letters from Sweden). But it was one of her chief contentions that far too much stress was laid on the cultivation of that kind of sensibility in women which in its very exaggeratedness leads to the worst excesses of sentimentalism. The eighteenth century interpretation of the term "sensibility" with its concomitant absurdities awakened in her feelings of intense disgust. All Rousseau's errors in her opinion arose from its source. To indulge his feelings, and not to imbibe moral strength at the fountain of Nature, or to satisfy a thirst for scientific investigation, he sought for solitude when meditating the rapturous but dangerous love-scenes of theNouvelle Héloise. No doubt these scenes were in her mind when she wrote: "Lovesuch as the glowing pen of genius has traced, exists not, or only resides in those exalted, fervid imaginations that have sketched such dangerous pictures." She only sees in them "sheer sensuality under a sentimental veil." The sentimentalists who, like Richardson and Rousseau, laid bare the play of the human passions to a reading public consisting almost entirely of women, whose minds were not sufficiently occupied to keep their imagination within bounds, "set fire to a house for the sake of making the pumps play."
Morbid sensibility, in its exaggerated tenderness over insignificant trifles and corresponding indifference to real social evils, excludes from the mind all sense of moral duty.
Two writers of Mary Wollstonecraft's time had shown a more than usual narrowness of views. They were the Rev. Dr. James Fordyce, author of a number of sermons addressed to women, and Dr. Gregory, who had written a "Legacy to his Daughters." The former proceeded from the propositions which had formed the basis of Rousseau's argument. He is so thoroughly convinced of the all-round superiority of man, that he assumes the natural folly of woman to be the cause of all matrimonial differences. He feels sure that women who behave to their husbands with "respectful observance", studying their humours and overlooking their mistakes, submitting to their opinion, passing by little instances of unevenness, caprice or fashion, and relieving their anxieties will find their homes "the abode of domestic bliss."
Fordyce held the principal charm of women to be a sickly sort of delicacy which, as it flatters the vanity of the male, is not wholly without effect even in our days, in spite of all Mrs. Fawcett may say to the contrary. Men of sensibility, he says, "desire in every woman soft features and a flowing voice, a form not robust, and demeanour delicate and gentle." This hint could only have the effect of making women more insipid than even Rousseau's Sophie, who at least after her marriage shared her husband's outdoor exercise. But the worst part of Fordyce's argument is that passage in which he advises young women to remember that the devout attitude of pious recollection (in prayer) is most likely to conquer a man's heart. When a clergyman thus by well-meant advice perverts his flock, what are we to expect from the grosser bulk of mankind!
As Mary Wollstonecraft justly points out, there is about these sermons, for all their sentimental posing and bombastic phrasing, a certain sneaking voluptuousness which would strike a modern womanas most insulting; a confident tone of proprietorship which could not fail to stimulate any woman of independent temper into revolt. Mrs. Rauschenbusch points out that Dr. Fordyce was acting in accordance with the tendencies of the Church in advocating that meekness and bearing of injuries without retaliation which are taught by the Gospel.
What particularly galled Mary was the hypocritical prostration of men before woman's charms, that mock politeness which seemed to her the most cruel proof of the degradation of her sex. The description of women by Fordyce as "smiling, fair innocents", and the frequent use of terms like "fair defects", "amiable weakness", etc. where women were concerned, sounded to her as an insult.
In Gregory's "Legacy to his Daughters" the case was slightly different. The author was an affectionate father, whose anxiety to shield his motherless girls induced him to become an author. That an honest, well-intentioned man like he should be capable of writing such trash makes us realise the hopelessness of Mary's task. He openly recommends dissimulation. For a woman to show what she feels must be termed indelicate. A girl should be careful to hide her gaiety of heart, "lest the men who beheld her might either suppose that she was not entirely dependent on their protection for her safety, or else entertain dark suspicions as to her modesty." In the lives of the poor Gregory girls Mrs. Grundy was omnipotent!
Unreserved praise, on the contrary, is bestowed upon Mrs. Catherine Macaulay's "Letters on Education with Observations on Religion and Metaphysical Subjects", which had appeared in 1790, shortly before their author's death. Mrs. Macaulay had been among the opponents of Burke in a vindication of a French government which owed its authority to the will of a majority; and also in matters educational her views coincided with those of Mary Wollstonecraft. She believed in co-education up to a certain age, which has the obvious advantage of making the daily intercourse between people of different sexes less strained and more natural not only in early youth, but also later in life, when the relations between the sexes ought to be based upon mutual appreciation and esteem. Like Mary Wollstonecraft, she protested against what she called "the absurd notion of a sexual excellence", which not only excluded the female sex from every political right, but left them hardly a civil right to save them from the grossest injuries. It was an unlucky circumstance indeed that the only woman who might have granted Mary the full support of her reputation as theauthor of a very successful work on the "History of England from the Accession of James the First to that of the Brunswick Line" should have been removed by death at a time when that support might have been of so much value to one who felt forsaken by the majority of her own sex.[47]
Mary Wollstonecraft pleads the necessity of giving woman an education like that which is granted to man, that she may learn to take Reason for her guide. Only then will she be able to perform the specific duties of her sex. But there is a weightier argument for the cultivation of Reason in women. Their deplorable deficiency in this quality has so far made them consider only earthly interests and disqualified them from looking beyond the affairs of this world to the promise of that eternity for which only the soul can fit them. It is in pointing out the evil consequences to the soul of a life devoted to pleasure that Mary's pleadings attain their greatest depth of pathos and intensity. The profound piety of her character makes her protest against this sordid view of life.
"Surely" she exclaims, "she has not an immortal soul who can loiter life away merely employed to adorn her person that she may amuse the languid hours and soften the cares of a fellow-creature who is willing to be enlivened by her smiles and tricks when the serious business of life is over."
Once a woman has attained her aim of a profitable marriage, the circumstances of which almost exclude the possibility of love, she turns all her "natural" cunning to account to establish a sort of mock tyranny over her master. She lives in the enjoyment of her present influence, forgetting that adoration will cease with the loss of her charms, and that woman is "quickly scorned when not adored". In later years there will be no sound basis of friendship arising from equality of tastes to take its place, no reflection to be substituted for sensation, and their earthly punishment consists in a miserable old age. Even when married to a sensible husband, who thinks for her, what will be the fate of a woman who is left a widow with a large family? "Unable to educate her sons, or to impress them with respect, she pines under the anguish of unavailing impotent regret." The passage in which she pictures her ideal of rational womanhood, who, far from being rendered helpless by her husband's death, rises to the occasion and devotes herself with a strong heart to the discharge ofher maternal duties, finally reaping the reward of her care when she sees her children attain a strength of character enabling them to endure adversity, is a piece of true eloquence. "The task of life fulfilled, she calmly waits for the sleep of death, and rising from the grave, may say: "Behold, thou gavest me a talent, and here are five talents".[48]
There never was a more fervent champion of marriage and domesticity than Mary. The sanctity of matrimony needed no enforcement by means of a wedding ceremony, but consisted in the mutual affection and esteem which was felt. Hence her violent criticism of loveless marriages contracted from mercenary motives and her severe condemnation of the harshness with which society treated poor ruined girls.
The twelfth chapter of theRights of Womencontains a plea for national education. Mary is here seen treading in the steps of Talleyrand, and forsaking her old masters Locke and Rousseau. They both advocate a private education. Locke wants to educate the "gentleman", making his scheme practicable in isolated applications, but disregarding the bulk of the nation.
Rousseau, who did regard the mass of the people in matters of political speculation, entirely loses sight of the public interest in favour of the private in his educational scheme, thus reducing it to mere abstract speculation, incapable of extensive realisation. But Mary Wollstonecraft adopts the more practical view of the active socialist. The children of the nation are to be educated without the slightest reference to class distinction, and they ought to be brought up together. The exclusive teaching of a child by a tutor will make him acquire a sort of premature manhood, and will not tend to make him a good citizen. He is to be a member of society, and it will not do to regard him as a unit, complete in himself. The same view limits the freedom of the individual to what is compatible with the rights of others. To ignore the duties of the individual towards society would be to build the entire structure of education upon an unsound basis.
This plea for co-education will be seen to be a recantation from former opinions expressed in the "Original Stories". The latter had their rise chiefly in the experience gained of boarding-schools during her stay at Eton with the Priors. They seemed to her absolute hotbedsof vice and folly, where an utter want of modesty introduced the most repulsive habits. The younger boys delighted in mischief, the older in every form of vice. The colleges were full of the relics of popery, the 'mouth-service',which makes all religion but a cold parade of show, and the educators themselves were very poor champions of true religion. What Mary saw at Eton confirmed her in the belief that dayschools were to be preferred, as the only way of combining the advantages of private and public education.
That important part of education which aims at awakening the affections can only be given in the home of loving parents, and only that man can be a good citizen who has first learned to be a good son and brother. A country day-school, affording the best opportunities for unstinted physical exercise, might be expected to be productive of the greatest benefit to young pupils. The division of the educational task between school and home will moreover leave the children the necessary amount of freedom which is denied them when living the cramped lives of boarding-schools.
To make women the companions of men, and to remove the unhealthy atmosphere of an artificial separation of the sexes which produces indelicacy in both, she thinks it necessary that boys and girls should be brought up together. All children should be dressed regardless of class and submitted to the same rules of discipline. They should not be made to remain in the schoolroom for longer than an hour, and be taken out into the schoolyard, or better still, for walks. A good deal of outdoor instruction of the kind Rousseau described might be given by means of spectacular illustration.
At the age of nine comes the first great change in the daily routine. The two sexes will still be together in the morning, engaged in common pursuits, but the afternoon will find the girls bent over their needlework, millinery, etc., while the boys' further instruction will depend on their choice of a trade. Special schools ought to be established for those whose superior abilities render them fit to pursue some course of scientific studies.
Being thus together will take the edge off that unnatural restraint which too often marks the relations between children of a different sex. The position of the teachers—not ushers—should be such as to render them entirely independent of their pupils' parents. The usher's ambiguous position of mixed authority and submission frequently rendered him an object of ridicule to the children. Talleyrand, from whom Mary in all probability borrowed this suggestion,even wanted to make the children independent of their masters in respect of punishment, by having it inflicted only after the offender had been tried and found guilty by his peers.
It will be seen that the "Vindication of the Rights of Women" touches upon a great many points which at the present time have become foregone conclusions, but which, nevertheless, were in Mary's days daring speculations, which were received with anything but general approval.
If it should now appear to us that some of her conclusions were rather too sweeping, that the very physical inferiority of woman which she is willing to grant makes it impossible for her to combine in her person the wife, the mother and the social woman, and that a too ardent application of her theories of the social possibilities of her sex is responsible for some abominations of the public hustings, who, banging their fists on the table, "refuse to be the playthings of men any longer"—it should be remembered that she insisted with equal emphasis upon the cultivation of the female qualities, and that it was not granted her to be taught moderation by the repulsive spectacle of female extremism in later times! Moreover, in the introduction to the first edition of theVindication, she expresses her disgust of "masculine women". And yet the type of a "masculine woman" in Mary's days, with her "ardour in hunting, shooting and gaming", was not nearly so objectionable as her modern sister.
It is, indeed, very difficult to find anything to praise in theVindicationwhen viewed as a literary effort. Mary Wollstonecraft herself clearly did not regard it as such. The importance of the object by which she was animated made her disdain to cull her phrases or polish her style, wishing rather to persuade by the force of her arguments than dazzle by the elegance of her language. Unfortunately the former is not inconsiderably weakened by a deplorable tendency to reiteration, and a general desultoriness and lack of system which cannot fail to strike the reader. The "flowery diction" which she professed herself anxious to avoid, but did not succeed in completely banishing, is responsible for a great deal of the turgidity and false rhetoric which disfigure certain passages.
Godwin, whose unemotional nature enabled him to judge of his wife's work without prejudice and whoseMemoirscontain a most sincere and therefore valuable criticism, although admiring the courage of her convictions, the disinterestedness of her motives and the originality of her contentions, finds fault with what he calls "thestern and rugged nature" of certain passages which will probably impress the modern reader as coarse and indelicate. Her great devotion to the cause may account for the "amazonian" temper which fills some parts of her book, more especially the "animadversions" on the opinions of those of her opponents whose "backs demanded the scourge". Her disapproval of Lord Chesterfield's moral standpoint has already been referred to. Mary Wollstonecraft was not in the habit of mincing matters, and her sincerity and consequent frankness brought her the ill-will of many.
The publication of theRights of Womenat once brought Mary into prominence. Unfortunately, the scare of a French invasion and the trial of the reformers were most unfavourable to the spread of any new ideas in England. From her sisters she had little sympathy, and "poor Bess" rather spitefully alluded to information she had received to the effect that "Mrs. Wollstonecraft was grown quite handsome" and intended going to Paris. For this trip to France there were several causes. In the first place she felt intensely interested in the march of events there, which were hastening to a crisis, Louis XVI being a prisoner in the hands of the Convention. The second motive—perhaps the principal—was connected with her friendship for Mr. Fuseli, the celebrated Swiss painter; but whether she hoped to make the trip in company with the Fuselis and her friend Johnson, as Mr. Kegan Paul supposes[49], or wanted to get away from the influence of the artist, with whom Godwin informs us she was in love, is uncertain. The end was that she went to Paris alone in December 1792, and boarded at the house of Mme Filliettaz, a lady in whose school Eliza and Everina had been teachers, but who was absent from home, so that Mary's French was put to the severe test of conversation with the servants.
She now became a close spectator of the progress of that Revolution which upon the whole had her sympathy. Yet it was with mingled feelings that she saw the chariot pass her house in which the royal prisoner was conveyed to his trial a few days after her arrival. The sight of Louis going to meet death with more dignity than she expected from his character, brought before her mind the picture of his ancestor Louis XIV, entering his capital after a glorious victory, and pity, her ruling passion, interceded for the poor victim who had to pay for the crimes of his forefathers.
Economy prescribed her removal from the Filliettaz mansion to less pretentious quarters at Neuilly, where she was left a great deal to herself, save for an occasional visit to her English friends in Paris Miss Williams and Mrs. Christie. It was at the latter's house that a meeting took place which decided the next few years of her life.
Her days at Neuilly were thus spent in retirement. She had a devoted old gardener to wait upon her and generally went out for a walk in the evening, the hours of daylight being given up to the composition of a new work, combining history with philosophy and inspired by the stirring events to which she was such a close witness. Although not published until some years after, "An Historical and Moral View of the Origin and Progress of the French Revolution, and the Effect it has produced in Europe" was written in the first months of 1793 at Neuilly. The Advertisement with which it opens declares the author's intention of extending the work to two or three more volumes, a considerable part of which, it informs us, had already been written; but Godwin assures us that no part of the proposed continuation was found among her papers after her death. The only existing volume both in style and method shows a very decided advance upon the earlierVindication. Mary's narrative powers were even greater than her capacity for philosophy, and her imagination had been fired by the thrilling accounts she had received from her Parisian friends of the march of events. The greater freedom and fluency of the style, the greater cogency of the reasoning and the dignity of the narrative render the volume very pleasant reading, the more so, as it shows great moderation and impartiality as far as actual facts are concerned. That the delineations of personal character are not always felicitous may be due to the fact that the author obtained all her information from witnesses who were not free from the prejudices which strong party-feelings awaken. On the whole, however, Mary succeeded in placing herself above her subject and in proving that time had taught her to modify her extreme views and made her readier to grant certain concessions. The book is a compromise between her former principles of abstract philosophy and those of gradual evolution. Although unwilling to abandon her original view that "Reason beaming on the grand theatre of political changes, can prove the only sure guide to direct us to a favourable or just conclusion", and that the erroneous inferences of sensibility should be carefully guarded against, yet she felt sufficient appreciation for her old enemy Burke's principle of growth to admit that the Revolution was the natural consequenceof intellectual improvement, gradually proceeding to perfection.
Never before had her hopes been so sanguine. It seemed to her that the time was at hand for the final overthrow of the tremendous empire of superstition and hypocrisy. What, in comparison with the great end in view, were the inevitable horrors of the Revolution, produced by desperate and enraged factions? There is not a single page in the history of man but is tarnished by some foul deed or bloody transaction. That the vices of man in a savage state make him appear an angel compared with the refined villain of artificial life finds its cause in those unjust plans of government which exist in every part of the globe. A simpler and more effective political system would be sure to check those evils, and a faithful adherence to the new principles will lead mankind towards happiness.
Her feelings for mankind, however strong, were not powerful enough to interfere with the coolness of her judgment, and the light of her reason which was so soon to be temporarily eclipsed by the conflict of passions a thousand times more powerful because proceeding from within, was never obscured by the contemplation of social evils, which could not disturb her optimistic faith.
The history of the French Revolution is traced down to the king's removal to Paris, where he was sent to stand for trial. It is, upon the whole, a successful attempt at impartial narrative not only of the course of events in Paris, but also of the causes which produced them, the author indulging in a minute survey of the state of French society and politics previous to and during the catastrophe. The severity of the judgment she passes on the king and more especially on Marie Antoinette has been commented upon. Here especially it should be remembered that she had everything from hearsay. What she heard of the character and actions of the queen struck her as characteristic of the type of womanhood she had so violently attacked in theRights of Women. She saw in Marie Antoinette the product of education by a priest, who had instilled into her all those vices which Mary held in abhorrence. She was devoted to a life of pleasure, vain of her good looks, but dead to intelligence and benevolence, using the fascination of her cultivated smiles and artificial weakness to exercise the tyranny of sex over a sensual, besotted husband, whose depravity she completed; an artificial dissembler, regarding only decorum, without any reference to moral character, making free with the nation's money to support a worthless brother, and depraving the morals of those around her; in short, Mary Wollstonecraft regarded her as theBabylonian scarlet woman, a sort of "painted Jezebel." Her judgment is diametrically opposed to that of Burke, who went into such raptures over the beauty and dignity of the queen, and gave vent to such a burst of indignation at her sad and ignominious fate that Thomas Paine saw fit to remind him that "while pitying the plumage, he was forgetting the dying bird."
The outer revolution which was to assert the rights of the species was followed by an inner revolution in the individual which came to constitute the tragedy of Mary Wollstonecraft's life. The Father of Nature, whom she thanked for having made her so intensely alive to happiness, had also implanted in her breast an overwhelming capacity for sorrow, and after a short taste of the former, the latter became her portion to such an extent that life seemed to her unendurable.
The letter to Mr. Johnson referring to the king's trial was the last news her friends in England received from her for eighteen months. In February 1793 war broke out between England and France and Mary's nationality made it advisable for her to keep close. Among her new acquaintances was an American, Captain Gilbert Imlay, and the tenderness which about this time she began to cherish for him, was no doubt fostered by a sense of loneliness. Moreover, that affection for Mr. Fuseli which she had so resolutely suppressed,—Fuseli was happily married—left her more vulnerable than before to Cupid's arrows, in addition to which Imlay was to her the representative of that nation which embodied her ideals of liberty and virtue. She gave herself up body and soul to the all-devouring passion of love, and Reason, seeing another in full possession of the field, "with a sigh retired."
Mr. Imlay had served as a captain in the revolutionary army during the War of Independence, and derived some slight literary fame from the publication of a short monograph on the state of America, entitled "Topographical Description of the Western Territory of North America." He was, therefore, a man of some accomplishments, which makes his subsequent behaviour to Mary all the more unpardonable.
At the time of Mary's first meeting him he appears to have been in business—probably his line was timber—and the dealings of his trade claimed a great deal of his time and nearly all his attention. Circumstances putting marriage out of the question,—a wedding-ceremony would have betrayed that nationality she was so anxious to conceal—she consented to live with him as his wife by virtue of their mutual affections. His correspondence shows that he regardedher as his lawful wife, and as Mary fully expected the alliance to be of a permanent nature, and believed him capable of that affection which Reason causes to subside into friendship after the first flame of passion is spent, she was acting in full accordance with the views she had repeatedly expressed.[50]
The letters which she wrote him in the first stage of their growing intimacy are full of exquisite tenderness. Her repeated "God bless you", which Sterne says is equal to a kiss, shows the depth of her feelings towards him. Seldom was a purer, more unselfish love wasted upon a more unworthy recipient. Imlay was a "mere man", of a cheerful disposition and to a certain extent good-natured, but easy-going, self-indulgent, inconstant and incapable of appreciating a noble love which he himself could not cherish. He evidently looked upon his relation to Mary as the amusement of a day,—she lavished upon him that which might have made a greater soul happy for life. She tried to draw him up to her level and failed; her efforts to cure him of his sordid love of money which so disgusted her only irritated him, and made him anxious to cast off the bonds of a union of which he soon began to tire. Their agreement had been entered upon in a different spirit, and it was Mary who paid the full penalty of disillusionment. A letter he wrote to Mrs. Bishop in November 1794, when the estrangement had already begun, at a time when Mary was deeply conscious of the fact that he neglected her for business and perhaps worse, in which he states that he is "in but indifferent spirits occasioned by his long absence from Mrs. Imlay and their little girl" shows that he cannot even be acquitted from the charge of absolute hypocrisy.
Such was the individual whom Mary had appointed the sole keeper of her possibilities of happiness. Love had come to her late in life, but when it did, it took the shape of that complete surrender in which consists woman's greatest bliss and which she had never thought possible. It came as a revelation and brought experience in its train. Who shall describe the anguish of her heart when after a short spell of ecstatic bliss, the inevitable truth began to dawn upon her! Mary was not an essentially sensual woman; almost from the first she looked for that sympathy of the mind which was not forthcoming. She found him wanting, and the recognition of this probably irritated him, and ultimately made him transfer his easy-going affections to those who were less exacting. He was far too matter-of-fact tosympathise with or even understand her moments of tenderness, and too much occupied with his business to be much of a companion to her. In the month of September, after a few months together, he went to Hâvre. Then it was that Mary's troubles began. In her letters she repeatedly protested against his prolonged absences. She grew to hate commerce, which kept him away from her. His promise "to make a power of money to indemnify her for his absence", failed to produce any impression. Perhaps there was already then the vague fear of a possible desertion haunting her. She was in expectations, and the tenderness with which her letters refer to the coming event would stamp a repetition of her hopes and fears as an indelicacy. For the first time in her life, the champion of the rights of women was happy in acknowledging the superiority of a man. "Let me indulge the thought that I have thrown out some tendrils to cling to the elm by which I wish to be supported." Well might she say that this was talking a new language for her! The feelings, so long pent up and cheated of their birthright by tyrannical Reason, were indeed asserting themselves with a vengeance!
The undefined dread of coming disaster makes her letters more and more insistent. Grief and indignation at Imlay's neglect struggle for the mastery. At last he wrote to ask her to join him at Hâvre. The irritation he had felt against her—which she humbly ascribed to the querulous tone of her correspondence—had worn away and there was a brief renewal of happiness when in the spring of 1794 a little girl was born, to whom the name of Fanny was given in commemoration of the friend of Mary's youth.
In the course of the following August Imlay went to Paris, where Mary joined him in September, at the end of which month he proceeded to London on business. The extensive trade he was carrying on with Sweden and Norway at this time completely engrossed him. Mary's first letters after this fresh separation were cheerful and pleasant, although she was subject to occasional fits of depression. The conviction that Imlay was about to forsake her does not appear to have taken root until the closing month of the year. The days of the Terror were now over, and people once more breathed freely. Mary made an heroic effort to let the future take care of itself and to concentrate her attention upon her little girl, who developed an early fondness for scarlet coats and music, and on one occasion wore the red sash in honour of J. J. Rousseau, her mother confessing that "she had always been half in love with him."
Imlay's letters now became few and far between. His business-schemes were unsuccessful, and Mary took the opportunity to point out to him the absurdity of thus wasting life in preparing to live. The tone of her correspondence betrays a growing indignation at his treatment of her, which appeared in spite of herself and which repeated protestations of unalterable affection could not hide. "I do not consent to your taking any other journey," she writes, "or the little woman and I will be off the Lord knows where." She wants none of his cold kindness and distant civilities, but wishes to have him about her, enjoying life and love. The picture of sweet domesticity, of parents sharing the sacred duty of education, of pleasant evenings of homely tenderness spent at the fireside, recurred to her mind with a sense of aching regret. She would far sooner struggle with poverty than go on living this unnatural life of separation. Too proud to be under pecuniary obligations to a neglectful husband, she began to consider the possibility of having to provide for herself and her child.
When at last he allowed her to join him in England, she no longer cherished false hopes, but begged him to tell her frankly whether he had ceased to care. But Imlay wanted her support for his business-schemes. He asked her to go to Sweden and Norway for him to attend to his interests and Mary consented with a heavy heart, hoping that a complete change of surroundings might afford distraction, if not amusement, for she was feeling utterly worn out and ill.
Imlay kept up the melancholy farce a few months longer. Mary wrote him a series of long epistles from Scandinavia, into which, as a means of keeping her mind concentrated upon other matters, she inserted elaborate descriptions of the voyage, of the countries in which she was travelling, and of their inhabitants.
Of these letters, the descriptive portions of which were published in 1796, Godwin speaks highly. Their perusal caused him to change his opinion of the author of theRights of Women. Their first, and so far only, meeting—in November 1791—had not prepossessed him in her favour. She seemed to him to monopolize the conversation, and prevented him from listening to Tom Paine, who never was a great talker, and whom she reduced to absolute silence. But he now learned to think highly of her literary talent. The passages dealing with personal affairs had of course been omitted, and afterwards found their way into Godwin'sPosthumous Edition of the Works of Mary Wollstonecraft, and also into Mr. Kegan Paul's collection ofLetters to Imlay. The tone of despair has on the whole given way to one ofresigned melancholy. In spite of the sadness which prevailed in Mary's heart, the change was doing her good, and her health was improving rapidly. Before her arrival at Tonsberg in Sweden, she had felt very ill, a slow fever preyed on her every night. One day she found "a fine rivulet filtered through the rocks and confined in a basin for the cattle." The water was pure, and she determined to turn her morning-walks towards it and seek for health from the nymph of the fountain. She also wished to bathe, and there being no convenience near, took to rowing as a pleasant and at the same time useful exercise.
While thus the flush of health was returning to her cheeks, she found it easier to arrive at a conclusion. She made up her mind that there should be an end to all uncertainty. Imlay was put before a dilemma. Either they must live together after her return, or part forever. Still he kept flattering her with the hope that he might join her at Hamburg, for a trip to Switzerland, the country of her dreams since the days of Neuilly. But he did not keep his word, and when Mary landed at Dover in October 1795, she realised that all was over and that Imlay had entered into a new connection with an actress.
Then it was that Mary made up her mind to die. The harrowing details of her fruitless attempt at suicide may be found in Godwin'sMemoirsand also in Mr. Kegan Paul's work. After her rescue she learnt to live for her child's sake, and not to flinch from the sacred duties which tied her to life. Imlay passed out of her sphere, and she parted with him in peace. But the sufferings through which he had made her pass had stamped themselves indelibly upon her heart.
The "Letters written during a Short Residence in Sweden, Norway and Denmark" met with a favourable reception. Being the narrative of foreign travel, they mark a new departure in her literary career. She held with Rousseau that travelling, as the completion of a liberal education, ought to be adopted on rational grounds.[51]The writing of a journal was to her a means of keeping the mind employed, and preventing it from dwelling overmuch on painful recollections of disappointed hopes. Her works of education and reform had been so full of the militant spirit, and her correspondence with Imlay so replete with the anguish of unrequited love, that she had not yet come to recognise the soothing effect upon the mind of a close communion with Nature. It is in the Scandinavian correspondence that theNature-element is first met with. The contemplation of the grand coast-scenery gave her that peace and quiet for which her heart yearned. It did not bring her forgetfulness of present troubles, but it gave her the necessary strength to meet them without flinching. In her little boat, surrounded by the glorious works of Nature, she found herself for the first time capable of grappling with her problem, which the sense of human insignificance reduced to its true proportions. The nature of her worship stamps her as the true spiritual child of Jean-Jacques. The writers of an earlier period had been able to appreciate only what is congenial in nature. The forbidding austerity of the snow-clad mountains of Switzerland had produced no raptures in Goldsmith's breast, and Cowper's English landscape owed its attractiveness to its suggestion of peaceful harmony. Rousseau had been the first to love Nature also in her sterner moods and aspects; like Wordsworth, "the sounding cataract haunted him like a passion", and theNouvelle Héloisecontains the faithful record of the impressions produced upon him by the grandeur of the Valais mountains. Some of Mary's nature-descriptions—notably those of the Trolhaettan Falls, and of the rocky Norwegian coast—afford a parallel to these passages. She was deeply impressed by the wonders of Nature she witnessed, and by the exquisite loveliness of the short northern summer. "In the evening the western gales which prevail during the day, die away, the aspen leaves tremble into stillness, and reposing Nature seems to be warmed by the moon, which here assumes a genial aspect; and if a light shower has chanced to fall with the sun, the juniper, the underwood of forest, exhales a wild perfume, mixed with a thousand nameless sweets, that, soothing the heart, leave images in the memory which the imagination will ever hold dear."
There is an anticipation of Wordsworth in the last line of the above passage. Mary recognises in Nature "the nurse of sentiment", producing melancholy as well as rapture, as it touches the different chords of the human soul like the changing wind which agitates the aeolian harp.
Her worship of Nature, like that of Wordsworth, contains an element of profound piety. When she wrote her letters from Sweden, Mary had reached that stage in her religious life which is marked by a complete silence as far as dogma is concerned. Yet this silence should not be misconstrued into indifference. Her feelings on the subject were not of the nature of a systematic creed, and therefore never took an external organisation. They remained perfectly subjective in theirvagueness, like the natural religion of Rousseau with which they have so much in common. Mary did not care to become an apostle of faith, to her religion was rather a matter of the inner life, which wanted no outlet into the world, but remained locked up in itself. She believed that her rational powers enabled her to discover certain portions of Truth, but that the mystery which veiled the presence of God could not be removed by Reason, but remained a matter of the heart. There is no touch of rationalism, or anything but pure sentiment, in the passage in which she describes her return from Fredericshall in a perfect summer night. "A vague pleasurable sentiment absorbed me, as I opened my bosom to the embraces of Nature, and my soul rose to its author, with the chirping of the solitary birds, which began to feel, rather than see, advancing day."
A great deal of attention is paid in the letters to the national character of the inhabitants of Sweden, Norway and Denmark, which she holds to be the result chiefly of the climatic conditions. Never had she seen the blessings of civilisation more clearly demonstrated than by the utter lack of them among the Scandinavians. Especially in Sweden, civilisation was at that time in its earliest infancy, and what struck Mary from the first was the ignorance of the people. What she saw of their manners and customs was not calculated to make her fall in love with Rousseau's golden age of simplicity. They were full of vices, and their very virtues had their origin in considerations of a lower order. They were hospitable, but their hospitality, arising from a total want of scientific pursuits, was merely the outcome of their inordinate fondness of social pleasures, "in which, the mind not having its proportion of exercise, the bottle must be pushed about."
Being ignorant of the advantages of the cultivation of the mind, they were content to remain as they were: ignorant, sluggish and indifferent to social progress. They moved in a narrow sphere, did not care for politics, had no interest whatever in literature and no topics of conversation, and were strangely incapable of appreciating the charms of Nature. Mary's experience was chiefly gained in the small provincial towns. They necessarily presented to her—so she thought—the worst side of the picture. To her, the ideal condition was "to rub off in a metropolis the rust of thought, and polish the taste which the contemplation of Nature had rendered just." But no place seemed to her so disagreeable and unimproving as a small country-town.