19-11-2011, 05:15 PM | #51 |
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Re: नारी विमर्श
The soul that idleth will surely die. I am sorry to have to say so, but there are some women who love to be miserable, who have a perfect genius for martyrdom, who take a delight in seeing how badly they can be treated, who seek out hard ways for their feet, who court tears rather than laughter. Such a one is hard to live with, for they glory in their cross, and simply revel in their burdens, and they so contrive that all who come in contact with them become a party to their martyrdom, and thus even innocent people, who never intended to oppress the weak or harass the innocent, are led into these heinous sins. Mrs. M. was one of these. She prided herself on never telling anyone to do what she could do herself. Her own poetic words were: "I'd crawl on my hands and knees before I would ask anyone to do things for me. If they can't see what's to be done, I'll not tell them." This was her declaration of independence. Needless to say, Mrs. M. had a large domestic help problem. Her domestic helpers were continually going and coming. The inefficient ones she would not keep, and the efficient ones would not stay with her. So the burden of the home fell heavily on her, and, pulling her martyr's crown close down on her head, she worked feverishly. When she was not working she was bemoaning her sad lot, and indulging in large drafts of self-pity. The holidays she spent were in sanatoriums and hospitals, but she gloried in her illnesses. She would make the journey upstairs for the scissors rather than ask anyone to bring them down for her, and then cherish a hurt feeling for the next hour because nobody noticed that she was needing scissors. She expected all her family, and the maids especially, to be mind readers, and because they were not she was bitterly grieved. There is not much hope for people when they make a virtue of their sins.
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दूसरों से ऐसा व्यवहार कतई मत करो, जैसा तुम स्वयं से किया जाना पसंद नहीं करोगे ! - प्रभु यीशु |
19-11-2011, 05:16 PM | #52 |
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Re: नारी विमर्श
She often told the story of what happened when her Tommy was two days
old. She told it to illustrate her independence of character, but most people thought it showed something quite different. Mr. M. was displeased with his dinner on this particular day, and, in his blundering man's way, complained to his wife about the cooking and left the house without finishing his meal. Mrs. M. forthwith decided that she would wear the martyr's crown, again and some more! She got up and cooked the next meal, in spite of the wild protests of the frightened maid and nurse, who foresaw disaster. Mrs. M. took violently ill as a result of her exertions just as she hoped she would, and now, after a lapse of twenty years, proudly tells that her subsequent illness lasted six weeks and cost six hundred dollars, and she is proud of it! A wiser woman would have handled the situation with tact. When Mr. M. came storming upstairs, waving his table-napkin and feeling much abused, she would have calmed him down by telling him not to wake the baby, thereby directing his attention to the small pink traveler who had so recently joined the company. She would have explained to him that even if his dinner had not been quite satisfactory, he was lucky to get anything in troublous times like these; she would have told him that if, having to eat poor meals was all the discomfiture that came his way, he was getting off light and easy. She might even go so far as to remind him that the one who asks the guests must always pay the piper. There need not have been any heartburnings or regrets or perturbation of spirit. Mr. M. would have felt ashamed of his outbreak and apologized to her and to the untroubled Tommy, and gone downstairs, and eaten his stewed prunes with an humble and thankful heart. This love of martyrdom is deeply ingrained in the heart of womankind, and comes from long bitter years of repression and tyranny. An old handbook on etiquette earnestly enjoins all young ladies who desire to be pleasing in the eyes of men to "avoid a light rollicking manner, and to cultivate a sweet plaintiveness, as of hidden sorrow bravely borne." It also declares that if any young lady has a robust frame, she must be careful to dissemble it, for it is in her frailty that woman can make her greatest appeal to man. No man wishes to marry an Amazon. It also earnestly commends a piece of sewing to be ever in the hand of the young lady who would attract the opposite sex! The use of large words or any show of learning or of unseemly intelligence is to be carefully avoided.
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दूसरों से ऐसा व्यवहार कतई मत करो, जैसा तुम स्वयं से किया जाना पसंद नहीं करोगे ! - प्रभु यीशु |
19-11-2011, 05:16 PM | #53 |
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Re: नारी विमर्श
People have all down the centuries blocked out for women a weeping
part. "Man must work and women must weep." So the habit of martyrdom has sort of settled down on us. I will admit there has been some reason for it. Women do suffer more than men. They are physically smaller and weaker, more highly sensitive and therefore have a greater capacity for suffering. They have all the ordinary ills of humanity, and then some! They have above all been the victims of wrong thinking--they have been steeped in tears and false sentiments. People still speak of womanhood as if it were a disease. Society has had its lash raised for women everywhere, and some have taken advantage of this to serve their own ends. An orphan girl, ignorant of the world's ways and terribly frightened of them, was told by her mistress that if she were to leave the roof which sheltered her she would get "talked about," and lose her good name. So she was able to keep the orphan working for five dollars a month. She used the lash to her own advantage. Fear of "talk" has kept many a woman quiet. Woman's virtue has been heavy responsibility not to be forgotten for an instant. "Remember, Judge," cried out a woman about to be sentenced for stealing, "that I am an honest woman." "I believe you are," replied the judge, "and I will be lenient with you."
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दूसरों से ऐसा व्यवहार कतई मत करो, जैसा तुम स्वयं से किया जाना पसंद नहीं करोगे ! - प्रभु यीशु |
19-11-2011, 05:16 PM | #54 |
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Re: नारी विमर्श
The word "honest" as applied to women means "virtuous." It has
overshadowed all other virtues, and in a way appeared to make them of no account. The physical disabilities of women which have been augmented and exaggerated by our insane way of dressing has had much to do with shaping women's thought. The absurdly tight skirts which prevented the wearer from walking like a human being, made a pitiful cry to the world. They were no doubt worn as a protest against the new movement among women, which has for its object the larger liberty, the larger humanity of women. The hideous mincing gait of the tightly-skirted women seems to speak. It said: "I am not a useful human being--see! I cannot walk--I dare not run, but I am a woman--I still have my sex to commend me. I am not of use, I am made to be supported. My sex is my only appeal." Rather an indelicate and unpleasant thought, too, for an "honest" woman to advertise so brazenly. The tight skirts and diaphanous garments were plainly a return to "sex." The ultra feminine felt they were going to lose something in this agitation for equality. They do not want rights--they want privileges--like the servants who prefer tips to wages. This is not surprising. Keepers of wild animals tell us that when an animal has been a long time in captivity it prefers captivity to freedom, and even when the door of the cage is opened it will not come out--but that is no argument against freedom. The anti-suffrage attitude of mind is not so much a belief as a disease. I read a series of anti-suffrage articles not long ago in the _New York Times_. They all were written in the same strain: "We are gentle ladies. Protect us. We are weak, very weak, but very loving." There was not one strong nourishing sentence that would inspire anyone to fight the good fight. It was all anemic and bloodless, and beseeching, and had the indefinable sick-headache, kimona, breakfast-in-bed quality in it, that repels the strong and healthy. They talked a great deal of the care and burden of motherhood. They had no gleam of humor--not one. The anti-suffragists dwell much on what a care children are. Their picture of a mother is a tired, faded, bedraggled woman, with a babe in her arms, two other small children holding to her skirts, all crying. According to them, children never grow up, and no person can ever attend to them but the mother. Of course, the anti-suffragists are not this kind themselves. Not at all. They talk of potential motherhood--but that is usually about as far as they go. Potential motherhood sounds well and hurts nobody.
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दूसरों से ऐसा व्यवहार कतई मत करो, जैसा तुम स्वयं से किया जाना पसंद नहीं करोगे ! - प्रभु यीशु |
19-11-2011, 05:17 PM | #55 |
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Re: नारी विमर्श
The Gentle Lady still believes in the masculine terror of tears, and
the judicious use of fainting. The Jane Austin heroine always did it and it worked well. She burst into tears on one page and fainted dead away on the next. That just showed what a gentle lady she was, and what a tender heart she had, and it usually did the trick. Lord Algernon was there to catch her in his arms. She would not faint if he wasn't. The Gentle Lady does not like to hear distressing things. Said a very gentle lady not long ago: "Now, please do not tell me about how these ready-to-wear garments are made, because I do not wish to know. The last time I heard a woman talk about the temptation of factory girls, my head ached all evening and I could not sleep." (When the Gentle Lady has a headache it is no small affair--everyone knows it!) Then the Gentle Lady will tell you how ungrateful her washwoman was when she gave her a perfectly good, but, of course, a little bit soiled party dress, or a pair of skates for her lame boy, or some such suitable gift at Christmas. She did not act a bit nicely about it! The Gentle Lady has a very personal and local point of view. She looks, at the whole world as related to herself--it all revolves around her, and therefore what she says, or what "husband" says, is final. She is particularly bitter against the militant suffragette, and excitedly declares they should all be deported. "I cannot understand them!" she cries. Therein the Gentle Lady speaks truly. She cannot understand them, for she has nothing to understand them with. It takes nobility of heart to understand nobility of heart. It takes an unselfishness of purpose to understand unselfishness of purpose. "What do they want?" cries the Gentle Lady. "Why some of them are rich women--some of them are titled women. Why don't they mind their own business and attend to their own children?"
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दूसरों से ऐसा व्यवहार कतई मत करो, जैसा तुम स्वयं से किया जाना पसंद नहीं करोगे ! - प्रभु यीशु |
19-11-2011, 05:17 PM | #56 |
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Re: नारी विमर्श
"But maybe they have no children, or maybe their children, like Mrs.
Pankhurst's, are grown up!" The Gentle Lady will not hear you--will not debate it--she turns to the personal aspect again. "Well, I am sure _I_ have enough to do with my own affairs, and I really have no patience with that sort of thing!" That settles it! She does not see, of course, that the new movement among women is a spiritual movement--that women, whose work has been taken away from them, are now beating at new doors, crying to be let in that they may take part in new labors, and thus save womanhood from the enervation which is threatening it. Women were intended to guide and sustain life, to care for the race; not feed on it. Wherever women have become parasites on the race, it has heralded the decay of that race. History has proven this over and over again. In ancient Greece, in the days of its strength and glory, the women bore their full share of the labor, both manual and mental; not only the women of the poorer classes, but queens and princesses carried water from the well; washed their linen in the stream; doctored and nursed their households; manufactured the clothing for their families; and, in addition to these labors, performed a share of the highest social functions as priestesses and prophetesses. These were the women who became the mothers of the heroes, thinkers and artists, who laid the foundation of the Greek nation. In the day of toil and struggle, the race prospered and grew, but when the days of ease and idleness came upon Greece, when the accumulated wealth of subjugated nations, the cheap service of slaves and subject people, made physical labor no longer a necessity; the women grew fat, lazy and unconcerned, and the whole race degenerated, for the race can rise no higher than its women. For a while the men absorbed and reflected the intellectual life, for there still ran in their veins the good red blood of their sturdy grandmothers. But the race was doomed by the indolent, self-indulgent and parasitic females. The women did not all degenerate. Here and there were found women on whom wealth had no power. There was a Sappho, and an Aspasia, who broke out into activity and stood beside their men-folk in intellectual attainment, but the other women did not follow; they were too comfortable, too well fed, too well housed, to be bothered. They had everything--jewels, dresses, slaves. Why worry? They went back to their cushions and rang for tea--or the Grecian equivalent; and so it happened that in the fourth century Greece fell like a rotten tree. Her conqueror was the indomitable Alexander, son of the strong and virile Olympia.
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दूसरों से ऐसा व्यवहार कतई मत करो, जैसा तुम स्वयं से किया जाना पसंद नहीं करोगे ! - प्रभु यीशु |
19-11-2011, 05:18 PM | #57 |
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Re: नारी विमर्श
The mighty Roman nation followed in the same path. In the days of her
strength, and national health, the women took their full share of the domestic burden, and as well fulfilled important social functions. Then came slave labor, and the Roman woman no longer worked at honorable employment. She did not have to. She painted her face, wore patches on her cheeks, drove in her chariot, and adopted a mincing foolish gait that has come down to us even in this day. Her children were reared by someone else--the nursery governess idea began to take hold. She took no interest in the government of the state, and soon was not fit to take any. Even then, there were writers who saw the danger, and cried out against it, and were not a bit more beloved than the people who proclaim these things now. The writers who told of these things and the dangers to which they were leading unfortunately suggested no remedy. They thought they could drive women back to the water pitcher and the loom, but that was impossible. The clock of time will not turn back. Neither is it by a return to hand-sewing, or a resurrection of quilt-patching that women of the present day will save the race. The old avenues of labor are closed. It is no longer necessary for women to spin and weave, cure meats, and make household remedies, or even fashion the garments for their household. All these things are done in factories. But there are new avenues for women's activities, if we could only clear away the rubbish of prejudice which blocks the entrance. Some women, indeed many women, are busy clearing away the prejudice; many more are eagerly watching from their boudoir windows; many, many more--the "gentle ladies," reclining on their couches, fed, housed, clothed by other hands than their own--say: "What fools these women be!" There are many women who are already bitten by the poisonous fly of parasitism; there are many women in whose hearts all sense of duty to the race has died, and these belong to many classes. A woman may become a parasite on a very limited amount of money, for the corroding and enervating effect of wealth and comfort sets in just as soon as the individuality becomes clogged, and causes one to rest content from further efforts, on the strength of the labor of someone else. Queen Victoria, in her palace of marble and gold, was able to retain her virility of thought and independence of action as clearly as any pioneer woman who ever battled with conditions, while many a tradesman's wife whose husband gets a raise sufficient for her to keep one maid, immediately goes on the retired list, and lets her brain and muscles atrophy. The woman movement, which has been scoffed and jeered at and misunderstood most of all by the people whom it is destined to help, is a spiritual revival of the best instincts of womanhood--the instinct to serve and save the race. Too long have the gentle ladies sat in their boudoirs looking at life in a mirror like the Lady of Shallot, while down below, in the street, the fight rages, and other women, and defenseless children, are getting the worst of it. But the cry is going up to the boudoir ladies to come down and help us, for the battle goes sorely; and many there are who are throwing aside the mirror and coming out where the real things are. The world needs the work and help of the women, and the women must work, if the race will survive.
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दूसरों से ऐसा व्यवहार कतई मत करो, जैसा तुम स्वयं से किया जाना पसंद नहीं करोगे ! - प्रभु यीशु |
19-11-2011, 05:19 PM | #58 |
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Re: नारी विमर्श
WOMEN AND THE CHURCH
HEART TO HEART TALK WITH THE WOMEN OF THE CHURCH BY THE GOVERNING BODIES Go, labor on, good sister Anne, Abundant may thy labors be; To magnify thy brother man Is all the Lord requires of thee! Go, raise the mortgage, year by year, And joyously thy way pursue, And when you get the title clear, We'll move a vote of thanks to you! Go, labor on, the night draws nigh; Go, build us churches--as you can. The times are hard, but chicken-pie Will do the trick. Oh, rustle, Anne! Go, labor on, good sister Sue, To home and church your life devote; But never, never ask to vote, Or we'll be very cross with you! May no rebellion cloud your mind, But joyous let your race be run. The conference is good and kind And knows God's will for every one!
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दूसरों से ऐसा व्यवहार कतई मत करो, जैसा तुम स्वयं से किया जाना पसंद नहीं करोगे ! - प्रभु यीशु |
19-11-2011, 05:20 PM | #59 |
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Re: नारी विमर्श
In dealing with the relation of women to the church, let me begin
properly with a text in Genesis which says: "God created man in his _own _image ... male and female created he _them_." That is to say, He created male man and female man. Further on in the story of the creation it says: "He gave _them_ dominion, etc." It would seem from this, that men and women got away to a fair start. There was no inequality to begin with. God gave _them_ dominion over everything; there were no favors, no special privileges. Whatever inequality has crept in since, has come without God's sanction. It is well to exonerate God from all blame in the matter, for He has been often accused of starting women off with a handicap. The inequality has arisen from men's superior physical strength, which became more pronounced as civilization advanced, and which is only noticeable in the human family. Among all animals, with the possible exception of cattle, the female is quite as large and as well endowed as the male. It is easy for bigger and stronger people to arrogate to themselves a general superiority. Christ came to rebuke the belief that brute strength is the dominant force in life. It is no wonder that the teachings of Christ make a special appeal to women, for Christ was a true democrat. He made no discrimination between men and women. They were all human beings to Him, with souls to save and lives to live, and He applied to men and women the same rule of conduct. When the Pharisees brought the woman to Him, accused of a serious crime, insistent that she be stoned at once, Christ turned his attention to them. "Let him that is without sin among you throw the first stone," he said. Up to this moment they had been feeling deliciously good, and the contemplation of the woman's sinfulness had given them positive thrills of virtue. But now suddenly each man felt the spotlight on himself, and he winced painfully. Ordinarily they would have bluffed it off, and laughingly declared they were no worse than other men. But the eyes of the Master were on them--kind eyes, patient always, but keen and sharp as a surgeon's knife; and measuring themselves up with the sinless Son of God, their pitiful little pile of respectability fell into irreparable ruin. They forgot all about the woman and her sin as they saw their own miserable sin-eaten, souls, and they slid out noiselessly. When they were gone Christ asked the woman where were her accusers.
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दूसरों से ऐसा व्यवहार कतई मत करो, जैसा तुम स्वयं से किया जाना पसंद नहीं करोगे ! - प्रभु यीशु |
19-11-2011, 05:20 PM | #60 |
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Re: नारी विमर्श
"No man hath condemned me, Lord," she answered truthfully.
"Neither do I condemn you," He said. "Go in peace--sin no more!" I believe that woman did go in peace, and I also believe that she sinned no more, for she had a new vision of manhood, and purity, and love. All at once, life had changed for her. The Christian Church has departed in some places from Christ's teaching--noticeably in its treatment of women. Christ taught the nobility of loving service freely given; but such a tame uninteresting belief as that did not appeal to the military masculine mind. It declared Christianity was fit only for women and slaves, whose duty and privilege it was lovingly to serve men. The men of Christ's time held His doctrines in contempt. They wanted gratification, praise, glory, applause, action--red blood and raw meat, and this man, this carpenter, nothing but a working man from an obscure village, dared to tell them they should love their neighbor as themselves, that they should bless and curse not. There was no fun in that! No wonder they began to seek how they could destroy him! Such doctrine was fit for only women and slaves! It is sometimes stated as a reason for excluding women from the highest courts of the church, that Christ chose men for all of his disciples--that it was to men, and men only, that he gave the command: "Go ye into the world and preach the gospel to every creature," but that is a very debatable matter. Christ's scribes were all men, and in writing down the sacred story, they would naturally ignore the woman's part of it. It is not more than twenty years ago that in a well-known church paper appeared this sentence, speaking of a series of revival meetings: "The converted numbered over a hundred souls, exclusive of women and children." If after nineteen centuries of Christian civilization the scribe ignores women, even in the matter of conversion, we have every reason to believe that Matthew, Mark, Luke or John might easily fail to give women a place "among those present" or the "also rans."
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दूसरों से ऐसा व्यवहार कतई मत करो, जैसा तुम स्वयं से किया जाना पसंद नहीं करोगे ! - प्रभु यीशु |
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