favourable for the exercise of high Christian principle, and the matured and refined Christian spirit, than that of persons who differ in tastes and general character being obliged by circumstances to live together, and mutually to accommodate to each other their respective wishes and pursuits. And this is one among the many providential benefits (to those who will receive them) arising out of the holy estate of Matrimony; which not only calls out the tenderest and gentlest feelings of our nature, but, where persons do their duty, must be in various ways more or less a state of self-denial."

In thus insisting upon a careful respect to home duties, do we not insist upon care for the servants of our house, a true part of the family, or "familia," even in the Roman view of home? Reform of the whole class of servants is strongly called for; "steadiness" is the most that is now looked for; seriousness is indeed rare; out of the whole class of communicants, rich and poor, the servant-class yields the fewest, and this is no faint proof of the condition of the class. We venture to hint, that, among other methods of reformation, it is of the highest importance to provide good books for servants. We should like to see a kitchen library in every house. Servants are great readers in their way, and at present they rather hurt than improve themselves by reading, through the cheapness of vicious, unprincipled, but exciting publications. Among men-servants the "Weekly Dispatch" is notoriously popular. We know no better method of hindering the circulation of bad books than by a countercirculation of good. Regular hours, home life, absence of gaiety and dissipation, the cessation of a constant flow of company; all these are among the most powerful of indirect methods of raising the religious character of our households.

Now in thus freely commenting on the present condition of the women of the upper classes, in contrasting them with no small portion of the same classes in former times, and in anxiously urging á return to a more domestic, unselfish, and Christian mode of life, we write hopefully and in good heart. Though we see great evils, we are not disposed to sink into the gloomy apathy of despair; it is no time to despond; we can discern a break in the sky. Though the smooth, deadly current of worldly life sweeps down with fearful force, and gathers into itself a vast multitude of lighter minds, there is, as we have already said, a counter-current setting in, breasting with the other tide, with a still, deep, and mysterious power; not noisily, not tumultuously, nor with great show of power, but steadily, and with a firm, unyielding earnestness. The Church is beginning to be stirred with a new life, and to lay hold of souls, and to work in them, and to possess them, with a spirit such as she has not had the grace to put forth

for a century and a half. We see the renewal of olden zeal, and faith, and love; we behold a more self-denying spirit spreading itself into the very seats of wealth,-simplicity of life, adopted as a duty and as a means to greater usefulness, the system of the Church better understood, more fully felt, and entered into and obeyed,—an increase of earnestness; and this earnestness tempered by a teachable spirit, and uniting itself to order. All these marks of renewed vitality give witness that ours is no ephemeral, no schismatical body, raised for a time to provoke the true body to faith and to good works, but a true, living, enduring branch of the Catholic Church.

Now this new zeal is animating the daughters of the Church; and we see a growing body of earnest-minded women, who are disentangling themselves from the frivolous, easy, and unsatisfying pleasures of the world, returning to their proper sphere of action, devoting themselves to a holy and charitable life, and yet showing that the course of true religion is not morose nor sour, that long-drawn faces and sombre looks are no part of genuine piety; but rather that they who give themselves to such a life have the true source of even, enduring cheerfulness. The importance of an increase and deepening of this true religion among the women of the higher ranks cannot be told; though woman's is a home mission, and so seems bounded within a narrow and quiet sphere, yet the influence there exercised spreads downward, upwards, and all around. Home is, as it were, the heart of the world; and the great body of the world takes its colour from the blood which issues from the heart, and which is itself unseen. We know not how much of the mother or the wife colours the actions of the men; what lines of public conduct issue from the spirit that was learnt at home. And hence, as we desire that our nobles, statesmen, lawyers, soldiers, physicians, merchants, all the members of the Church "in their vocation and ministry, should promote the glory of God by faithfully filling their parts as sons and servants of Jesus Christ, so we have an intensity of desire that women, the secret levers of such a weight of good or evil in the world, by a high spirituality of life, by giving a godly character to their homes, may have the grace given them to move towards good those whom they in any degree mould or influence.

We have now discussed the more important branches of the subject; but our pen, having once gained an impetus, and catching somewhat of the locomotiveness of the age, is disposed to run even into the by-lanes of the subject, rather than stop; so we must suffer it to take its course and fairly to run itself out, leaving the more hardy and persevering of our readers to follow

for a moment if they will. The by-lanes, indeed, into which we turn, open out, it must be confessed, a view of considerable importance, though we can but briefly consider it. When we urge

a return to greater domesticity, we are instantly led to look at the means for giving a continued interest to home. We want, of course, women to be "keepers at home," simply as a matter of duty, as their estate according to the Gospel, the sensual privacy of Eastern women being exchanged, not for publicity, but for an elevated retirement. But having taken this high ground, we may fairly look about and see what can be done to prevent their tiring of that which they dutifully undertake, to give them a permanent zest and relish for home life, and to prevent ennui from gradually making itself a place by the quiet fire-side. Thus, if there is to be more of home life, there must be more of home resources: bare unfurnished minds are but dreary things for daily use; women must be better educated, and have a stronger system of education. Without entering into the delicate question of the extent or character of their capacities, there cannot be a doubt in any reasonable mind that they are greatly undereducated at present; their minds are but gilt and plated with a thin coating of knowledge; a shallow mosaic is let in; like modern glass the colour is laid on, and not, as Hannah More observes, "burnt in:" the brush spreads a coloured wash over the whole, that looks well enough for the hasty glances of the multitude, who in society-life just look and pass on; but it will not bear the daily gaze, or daily wear.

"Society" has been the great vampire of women's minds; it is this which has weakened and vitiated the whole system of their education; it has been a system for show rather than for use; the surface of their minds has been brightened with a flimsy embroidery to fit them for society, to make an effect, as it were, by the candle-light of life. At eighteen, when their understandings are just beginning to gather strength, then the work of instruction is pronounced to be "finished;" they are veneered and polished up for the great show-rooms of the world; they walk forth from the school-room in supposed maturity. Such a system, so brief, so careful of the lighter and more trifling attainments, is wholly unworthy of their natural understandings, and leaves them with but slender resources for enlivening a domestic course of life. Too much is attempted in the school age, and much of that is of a wrong kind; the whole structure must not be begun, completed, and roofed in by eighteen, if it is to keep out dulness and ennui all the long winter nights. It is like starting for Russia with a bandbox of muslins and caps. Music, and worsted-work, and light reading, are well enough to fill up

the crevices of the day by way of relaxation, but they are not enough to give a constant charm to home life. All that can really be done in the school-age is to lay the foundation of knowledge, to get through the grammar, to have the ground well dug and prepared, to acquire habits of study and application: the hot-house haste of "abridgments" and compendiums will but produce a weak luxuriance of leaves.

In short, if schoolroom life is devoted only to the foundation, the girl prepared for after-study, no great burst into the world at eighteen first anticipated and then effected, but a gradual enlargement of intercourse with the circle of the parents' friends, then education, properly so called, would be carried on when school ceased. Though it would partake more of a voluntary character, yet it need not be a whit less vigorous for that. If the wrong impression be once done away, that every thing like real study is over when she “ comes out," she will continue, as a matter of course, to give herself to study, even though she has more freedom of motion, and the restraints of the schoolroom are removed; just as the best part of the education of men is carried on, when they are in a measure masters of themselves, and free to choose either ignorance or knowledge, their own good sense keeping them to their books, when the leading-strings of school are broken.

And when we say that the capacities of women are but faintly exercised, are not properly worked out and developed, are equal to stronger meat, we are not speaking at random, nor taking a Utopian view of the power of their minds; we speak soberly, and, as it were, from book; we look, as we have done in the former question, to actual women of past times; we see what they have attained, and thence we learn what they may attain again, if they were moulded in a stronger system. We turn to the Elizabethan age,-the strong age of English intellect,—and also to the succeeding century; there we see the goodly stature, which, under proper discipline, female understandings can reach. In the phalanx of strong-minded, well-informed women that there presents itself, Elizabeth herself stands first. Miss Strickland, the pleasant gossip of history, speaks much of Elizabeth's learning.

"Among the royal manuscripts in the British Museum is a small volume, in an embroidered binding, consisting of prayers and meditations selected from different English writers by Queen Katherine Parr, and translated and copied by the Princess Elizabeth, in Latin, French, and Italian. . . . . Like her elder sister, the Princess Mary, she was an accomplished Latin scholar, and astonished some of the most erudite linguists of that age, by the ease and grace with which

.....

she conversed in that language. French, Italian, Spanish, and Flemish, she both spoke and wrote, with the same facility as her native tongue. She was fond of poetry, and sometimes made verses that were not devoid of merit, but she only regarded them as the amusement of her leisure hours, bestowing more of her time and attention on the study of history, than on any thing else."

"French and Italian," says her tutor, Ascham, "she speaks like English; Latin, with fluency, propriety, and judgment. She also spoke Greek with me frequently, willingly, and moderately well. . . . . She read with me almost the whole of Cicero, and a great part of Livy.

The beginning of her day was always devoted by her to the New Testament in Greek; after which she read select Orations of Isocrates, and the Tragedies of Sophocles.... For her religious instruction she drew first from the fountains of Scripture, and afterwards from St. Cyprian, the Common-places' of Melancthon, and similar works."

Hume tells us of Lady Jane Grey, that

"She had attained a familiar knowledge of the Roman and Greek languages, beside modern tongues. . . . . Roger Ascham, having one day paid her a visit, found her employed in reading Plato, while the rest of the family were engaged in a party of hunting in the park; and in admiring the singularity of her choice, she told him that she received more pleasure from that author, than the others could reap from all their sport and gaiety."

Mildred Lady Burleigh was a good Greek scholar, and wrote a letter in that language to the University of Cambridge. Her learning was not confined to the Classic writers, but she deeply studied the Fathers of the Church, especially Basil, Cyril, Chrysostom, and Gregory Nazianzen. Her sister, the mother of Lord Bacon, was "eminent for piety, virtue, and learning, and well versed in the Greek, and Latin, and Italian tongues." She published a translation of several celebrated Italian sermons, which obtained the commendation of Archbishop Parker; while another sister, Lady Russell, was equally learned.

It would, of course, be easy to supply a list of well-read women; we allude only to a few specimens; and though we are far from expecting to see women of our day with the understanding of Elizabeth, still George Herbert's advice on a higher matter is applicable to this, that we had better shoot at the moon if we want to hit a high mark. Even if we regard the class of women we speak of as the "wranglers" of the sex, we might raise the standard many degrees without approaching them.

And if the general standard were raised, we need be under no fears of being over-run with female pedants. When a few women are infinitely better informed than the mass of their sex, there is then a strong temptation to learned vanity and parade; but