THE FEMININE INTELLECT.

North Otago Times, Volume 1, Issue 3, 10 March 1864, Page 3

THE FEMININE INTELLECT.

The intellect of woman is asserting its power in a vory remarkable manner amongst the living generation. The unprecedented development of female authorship, is one of the most significant of the signs of the times. The " mob of ladies ■who write with ease," is the greatest fact in current literature." In each separate department gentlemen find themselves equalled by their fair rivals. If, for instance, sensation fiction happens to be the u rage," some hitherto unnoted Miss Braddon steps forward with her Lady Aiidley's Sen et, and fairly takes precedence of both Sir E. L. Bulwer and Mr Wilkie Collins. In poetry, the name of E. B. Browning, entwined with that of the Laureate himself, as the two great singers of the age, will go down to posterity. In the domain of Universal Knowledge, what masculine intellect can pretend to carry off the prize from Harriett Martineau ? Whose pen but hers could have thrown the very labeis of romance around the hard dry fac's of Political Economy ? And as for the wide territory of social science, the ladies have conquered it all for themselves. Miss Faithful, and her band of co-workers, are actively engaged prosecuting that design which they have so well expressed :—": — " To emancipate the English woman from the shackles of prejudice which have hitherto restricted the development of their finest capabilities for happiness as well as usefulness." We most devoutly hope and earnestly believe this notable design will be entirely accomplished. Just fifty years ago, Sydney Smith said : — " A great deal has been said of the original difference of capacity between men and women, as if women were more quick and men more judicious — as if women were more remarkable for their delicacy of association and men for stronger powers of attention. All this, we confess, appears to us very fanciful. That there is a difference in the understandings of men and women is true, but any difference observable must be attributed to circumstances more than original conformation of the mind. As long as boys and giils run about in the dirt and tumble hoops together, they are both alike. If you catch up one half of these cieatures and tiain them to a particular set of actions and opinions, and the other half to a perfectly opposite set, of course thfir understandings will differ as one or other occupation has called this or that talent into operation." But vastly truer than this piece of pleasantry, is the remark of Mrs Anna Jamison, one of the most accomplished female intellects and finest writers that English literature can boast: — "We hear it asserted, not seldom by way of compliment to us « omen, that intellect is of no sex. If this meant, that the same faculties of mind are common to men and women, it is true. In any other signification it appeals to me false, and the reverse of a compliment The intellect of women bears the same relation to that of man as her physical organisation : it is inferior in power and different in kind. The essential and invariable distinction appeals to me to be this :—ln: — In men, the intellectual faculties exist selfpoised and self-directed, more independent of the rest of the character than we ever find them in women : with whom talent, however predominant, is in a great degree modified by the sympathies and moral qualities." In authorship, women are gifted with a finer perception of character ; they can better trace out the delicate shades and vaiiations of the sentiments ; they have a more exquisite sense of grace, of propriety, of the ridiculous ; they have a more profound sympathy with virtue and nobleness with grief and sorrow, and a more searching insight into hypocrisy, affectation, and selfishness. Their works are finished with a felicity of execution that excludes all idea of failure. These are the distinctive elements of female authorship ; and these elements must be always distinguishable, for " Woman is not undevelop'cl man, But diverse. Could Are malic herns the man, Sweet love vere slain. His dearest bond is this, Not like to like, but like in diffeience." This is the sum and substance of the whole discussion. Not inequality of power, but variety of Junction, marks ihe essential distinction between the intellects of the two sexes respectively. In kind, not in degree, they differ ; and the clear apprehension of this fact, which is daily forcing itself upon the world with increasing power, is steadily winning forthe femenine intellect its due place in -ibeAomwa^, of literature, and for woman i^^^^Jp higher and vastly more i^fluent|fe^^^^ in the vast fabric of humi't'n soci«§|§ii||ll