THE

JOURNAL OF HEALTH

AND

MONTHLY MISCELLANY.

"Health consists with Temperance alone."-POPE.

VOL. I.

BOSTON, OCTOBER, 1846.

No. 10.

AMERICAN WOMEN.

BY REV. H. WINSLOW.

A PAMPHLET has just been published by the Harpers, written by Miss C. E. Beecher, on "The Evils Suffered by American Women and American Children: the Causes and the Remedy." To this is also appended "An Address to the Protestant Clergy of the U. S." The pamphlet costs but 10 cents, and ought to be in the hands of every American, whether man or woman. It is a production of noble intellect, nobly directed. It is too late to say that the intellect of woman is inferior to that of man, or that it tannot be as loftily and usefully employed. We here see the fruits of early thorough training in Languages, Mathematics and Philosophy, as opposed to that superficial drilling of many fashionable schools, which does little else than enfeeble the mind, and fill it with vanity and conceit. It is, doubtless, true, that Miss Beecher is gifted with high native endowments; but there are thousands of young ladies in our land who can rise as high, and shine as conspicuously, in the great work of elevating and saving humanity, if, with the same high purpose, they will give themselves to the same culture.

But this is aside from the purpose of the present paper. The pamphlet alluded to has main reference to the intellectual and moral condition of American women; but it makes

some very instructive and important allusions to their physical and social condition. She would have the young ladies of our land, as a class, direct their thoughts more to the cause of education. She would have as wide and as glorious a field opened to female enterprise, in the great cause of teaching, as is opened to the other sex in the three Professions. Teaching is a Profession-the most comprehensive of all—and as fully open to woman as to man.

It cannot be doubted, that the social and physical condition of woman is greatly depressed by the unnatural, arbitrary, subjected position to which custom has condemned her. Until she has independence enough to say, I will be educated as a woman ought to be; I will make my health, heart, intellect, usefulness, my first study, despite of custom; I will, to my education at school, add a thorough training in all the domestic duties; I will refuse to be married till I am twenty-five years old, or, at least, have the maturity of preparation which that age ought to realize; I will calculate on a long, useful, happy life-devoted to my future family and the welfare of coming generations, and not on the delusive pleasures and vanities of the few fleeting hours of life's glittering morning.-Until she can effectually say this, she has yet to take the first step towards that excellence to which she ought to aspire. Hers must be the bitter regret-bitter indeed, and surely hers. There are no two ways here. Sin against nature is sin against God, and equally sin against our own souls.

After speaking of the large demand for female teaching in our land, and of the high motives inducing young ladies suitably to cultivate their powers and enter this field of usefulness, our authoress adds: The teacher "goes to rest at night, reviewing with gratitude the results of her toils; and, as she sends up her daily thanks and petitions for her little ones, how does the world of peace and purity open to her vision, when, by the river of life, she shall gather her happy flock, and look back to earth, and on through endless years, to trace the sublime and never ending results of her labors. O, beautiful office! sublime employment! when will it attain its true honors and esteem?" Such is the language of one who has been more than twenty years a teacher.

Designating the causes of so much feebleness and premature mortality of females in our country, the same

writer remarks: "Medical men point out this want of worthy objects to excite, as the true cause of a large class of diseases of mind and body that afflict females of the higher classes, who are not necessitated to exertion for a support, especially those who have no families. And the greater the capacity, and the nobler the affections, the keener is this suffering. It is only small and ignoble minds that can live contentedly without noble objects of pursuit. There is a restless, anxious longing for the know not what, while exciting amusements are rarely sought to fill the aching void. Every young lady might, the moment she leaves the school room, commence the exalted labor of moulding young minds for eternity; who, again, would transmit her handiwork from spirit to spirit, till thousands and thousands receive honor and glory from her hands. But the customs and prejudices of society forbid; and instead of this, a little working of muslin and worsted, a little light reading, and a great deal of the high stimulus of fashionable amusement, are all the aliment her starving spirit finds."

The very extensive acquaintance of Miss Beecher enables her to speak of the health of American women with great assurance. "A perfectly healthy woman," she writes, "especially a perfectly healthy young mother, is so unfrequent among the more wealthy classes, that it may be regarded as the exception, and not as the general rule. The number of those whose health is crushed before the first few years of married life are passed, would seem incredible to one who has not investigated the subject. To ⚫ill health and poor domestics, in a great majority of cases, are added total inexperience and ignorance in all the most difficult duties of a wife and mother." If our young ladies will read and ponder the following "sketch not from fancy," by this observer of facts, perhaps some of them will be less impatient to assume the responsibilities of the wife and mother: "See that young mother, sitting by-the disturbed slumbers of her sick infant, while her puny elder boy is fretting for his morning meal. She has passed a sleepless night-is sick and weary-her only domestic has forsaken her her hair is dishevelled-her dress discolored -her countenance pale and haggard. That was the bright young girl, who, four years age, had not known sorrowthe darling of her father-the pride of her mother-the

pet of her brothers, and the cynosure of fashion and pleasure. She had read, in novels and magazines, that marriage was the climax of woman's happiness; and, when the noblest and most beloved wooed her to enter this fairy land with him, she joyfully gave her hand. And now she is sitting in mute desolation, recalling her past brilliant career-her mother's love-her happy home." "When I so

often see gay young girls, in one short year, changed to the pale and anxious wife-directing a complicated householdmanaging wayward domestics-nursing a delicate infanttrying to accommodate to a husband's peculiarities, and harrassed by a thousand cares; and then have seen, too, how gently, how patiently, how bravely, they give up gay pleasure, and tend to their heavy toil,-I know not whether most to pity or admire. But I have known so much sickness, sorrow and discouragement among the young mothers of this land, that I seldom see a young bride led to the altar without a pang of the heartache.”

What sympathizing heart has not often felt the same? The prostration of health among the thousands of young American wives and mothers, is surely a subject that calls for the most intense consideration. The calamity must -be averted, or the Anglo-Saxon race will, not long hence, be among the things that were.

More attention must be paid to the early physical training and developement of children. Our young Missess must be more temperate in their pleasures and appetites

-more devoted to healthful activity, sober study and useful industry. They must, like the goodly women of another age, forgo novels, and theatres, and sugar plums, in favor of mental culture, domestic labor and wholesome food. If they finish their course at school-which should' be pursued with no less reference to their physical and moral, than to their intellectual improvement at the age of twenty, they must not rush straight to the bridal altar, as though impatient to be sacrificed; but devote some three or four years to training in the domestic duties, to teaching, and to advancing their general knowledge and their health to a condition adequate to the burdens to be assumed. Then the young wife will not be crushed, as now she too often is. Instead of being a feeble, blighted, drooping patient of the doctor, and candidate for the grave, at thirty, she will be, even at fifty, a blooming, healthy, happy wife

and mother; and, at seventy-five, she will adorn the thanksgiving chair, amid the caresses and benedictions of children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

PHYSICAL EDUCATION.

[For the Journal of Health, by Walter Channing, M. D.]

We have considered Physical Education in its relations to health; we have seen how its neglect leads to invalidism that condition which, if it, as it often does, allows of mental and physical activity, for the most part renders it laborious, painful and unsatisfactory; and we have also seen how the same thing predisposes to acute diseases. Persons of neglected physical culture are thus either for the most part actual invalids, or are prone to become seriously such by slight causes. We have also seen how character, as well as conduct, or the ability to act, come to be affected by the same thing.

A

Very little has been said of the means of physical health. This part of our subject has occupied a great deal of attention of late. Books of various merit, and of various sizes, are constantly appearing, which, in more or less detail, point out the means of preserving health. There is no great fear of men, or of women, as masses, taking too good care of themselves in this regard. Some have thought that too much care may sometimes be taken, or that sort of mental invalidism be produced which will lead the individual to be over anxious lest he violate some natural law. somewhat morbid conscience may in this way be produced, and ones life be so passed in a state of fear on the subject, which might be as bad, and as direful, as would be a more positive form of disease. Said a hale, stout looking man of about forty, one morning at breakfast table, to a young lady presiding, "Did you put a half, or a third, part of water to my cup of milk? I think it tastes a little stronger than usual." Said his host, (my friend was a visiter,) looking out of the tail of his eye, "I do not believe it will hurt you." Said an intelligent man one day, "Books on 'preserving health' seem written for invalids-for sick people-and to restore health, rather than to preserve it.