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HISTORY OF WOMAN SUFFRAGE.
right of United States citizenship. How can men thus delude themselves with the idea that what to them is ignominy unbearable is to women honor and glory unspeakable.[1]

An able address from Mrs. Matilda Joslyn Gage (N. Y.) arrived too late for the convention. It was a denial of the superiority of man from a scientific standpoint, and was so original in thought that it deserves to be reproduced almost in full:

. . . . We must bear in mind the old theologic belief that the earth was flat, the center of the universe, around which all else revolved—that all created things, animate and inanimate, were made for man alone—that woman was not part of the original plan of creation but was an after-thought for man’s special use and benefit. So that a science which proves the falsity of any of these theological conceptions aids in the overthrow of all.

The first great battle fought by science for woman was a Geographical one lasting for twelve centuries. But finally, Columbus, sustained and sent on his way by Isabella in 1492, followed by Magellan's circumnavigation of the globe twenty years later, settled the question of the earth’s rotundity and was the first step toward woman’s enfranchisement.

Another great battle was in progress at the same time and the second victory was an Astronomical one. Copernicus was born, the telescope discovered, the earth sank to its subordinate place in the solar system and another battle for woman was won.

Chemistry, long opposed under the name of Alchemy, at last gained a victory, and by its union of diverse atoms began to teach men that nature is a system of nuptials, and that the feminine is everywhere present as an absolute necessity of life.

Geology continued this lesson. It not only taught the immense age of creation, but the motherhood of even the rocks.

Botany was destined for a fierce battle, as when Linnæus declared the sexual nature of plants, he was shunned as having degraded the works of God by a recognition of the feminine in plant life.

Philology owes its rank to Catherine II of Russia, who, in assembling her great congress of deputies from the numerous provinces of her empire, gave the first impetus to this science. Max Muller declares the evidence of language to be irrefragable, and it is the only history we possess prior to historic periods. Through Philology we ascend to the dawn of nations and learn of the domestic, religious and governmental habits of people who left neither monuments nor writing to speak for them. From it we learn the original meaning of our terms, father and mother. Father, says Muller, who is a recognized philological authority, is derived from the root “Pa,” which means to protect, to support, to nourish. Among the earliest Aryans, the word mater (mother), from the
  1. Mise Anthony never wrote her addresses and no stenographic reports were made. Brief and inadequate newspaper accounts are all that remain.