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Prose

Notes All this—the sentiment of society with regard to Woman and to Marriage, the social condition of
Woman, and the consequent tendency and aim of her education,—the traveller must carefully observe.
Each civilized society claims for itself the superiority in its treatment of woman. In one, she is
indulged with religious shows, and with masquerades, or Punch, as an occasional variety. In another,
she is left in honourable and undisputed possession of the housekeeping department. In a third, she
is allowed to meddle, behind the scenes, with the business which is confided to her husband’s
management. In a fourth, she is satisfied in being the cherished domestic companion, unaware of the
injury of being doomed to the narrowness of mind which is the portion of those who are always
confined to the domestic circle. In a fifth, she is flattered at being guarded and indulged as a being
requiring incessant fostering, and too feeble to take care of herself. In a sixth society, there may be
found expanding means of independent occupation, of responsible employment for women; and
here, other circumstances being equal, is the best promise of domestic fidelity and enjoyment.
It is a matter of course that women who are furnished with but one object,—marriage,—must be
as unfit for anything when their aim is accomplished as if they had never had any object at all.
They are no more equal to the task of education than to that of governing the state; and, if any
unexpected turn of adversity befalls them, they have no resource but a convent, or some other
charitable provision. Where, on the other hand, women are brought up capable of maintaining an
independent existence, other objects remain where the grand one is accomplished. Their
independence of mind places them beyond the reach of the spoiler; and their cultivated faculty of
reason renders them worthy guardians of the rational beings whose weal or woe is lodged in their
hands. There is yet, as may be seen by a mere glance over society, only a very imperfect provision
made anywhere for doing justice to the next generation by qualifying their mothers; but the observer
of morals may profit by marking the degrees in which this imperfection approaches to barbarism.
Where he finds that girls are committed to convents for education, and have no alternative in life but
marriage, in which their will has no share, and a return to their convent, he may safely conclude that
there a plurality of lovers is a matter of course, and domestic enjoyments of the highest kind undesired
and unknown. He may conclude that as are the parents, so will be the children; and that, for one
more generation at least, there will be little or no improvement. But where he finds a variety of
occupations open to women; where he perceives them not only pursuing the lighter mechanic arts,
dispensing charity and organizing schools for the poor, but occupied in education, and in the study
of science and the practice of the fine arts, he may conclude that here resides the highest domestic
enjoyment which has yet been attained, and the strongest hope of a further advance.
From observation on these classes of facts,—the Occupation of the people, the respective Characters
of the occupied classes, the Health of the population, the state of Marriage and of Women, and the
character of Childhood,—the moralist may learn more of the private life of a community than
from the conversation of any number of the individuals who compose it.
Self Assessment
1. Fill in the blanks:
(i) Martineau’s reflections on Society in America, published in ........
(ii) The traveller everywhere finds woman treated as the........
(iii) In America, women can earn a maintenance only by teaching, sewing, and employment in
........
(iv) Auguste Comte coined the name………….
(v) Martineau edited a volume of Letters on the Laws of Man’s Nature and Development, published
in…………….
(vi) In Boston, Massachusetts, a woman is paid………
21.5 Summary

• The sixth of eight children, Harriet Martineau was born in Norwich, England, where her
father was a manufacturer. Her mother was the daughter of a sugar refiner and a grocer. The

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