Women Run in MoldsBy Frances Power Cobb(From “Woman’s Work and Woman’s Culture,” a compilation of essays published in 1869, in London.)
By Frances Power Cobb
(From “Woman’s Work and Woman’s Culture,” a compilation of essays published in 1869, in London.)
Of all the theories current concerning women, none is more curious than the theory that it is needful to make a theory about them. That a woman is a Domestic, a Social, or a Political creature; that she is a Goddess, or a Doll; the “Angel in the House,” or a Drudge, with a suckling of fools and a chronicaling of small beer for her sole privileges that she has, at all events, a “Mission,” or a “Sphere,” or a “Kingdom,” of some sort or other, if we could but agree on what it is,—all this is taken for granted. But, as nobody ever yet sat down and constructed analogous hypotheses about the other half of the human race, we are driven to conclude, both that a woman is a more mysterious creature than a man, and also that it is the general impression that she is made of some more plastic material, which can be advantageously manipulated to fit our theory about her nature and office, whenever we have come to a conclusion as to what that nature and office may be. “Let us fix our own Ideal in the first place,” seems to be the popular notion, and then the real Woman in accordance thereto will appear in due course of time. We have nothing to do but to make round holes and women will grow round to fill them; or square holes, and they will become square. Men grow like trees, and the most we can do is to lop or clip them, but women run in molds, like candles, and we can make them long-threes, or short-sixes, whichever we please.