I.

THE MISSION OF WOMAN.

HE Humanity of the Bible is scarcely less remarkable

THE

than its Divinity. For all classes of mankind,monarchs, peasants, nobles, servants, women, children, it has words of truth and sympathy. On this account, amongst others, it will never be worn out or superseded. So long as the world lasts it will be the chief source of direction, comfort, and hope to all mankind. Let us consider its teaching respect

ing woman.

The passages of Scripture at the head of this chapter furnish us with one declaration from the Old Testament, and two declarations from the New. The first was written by the greatest of prophets and lawgivers; the second is the utterance of our Divine Lord and Saviour; the third is the statement of the greatest of apostles. Upwards of four thousand years elapsed between the first of these utterances and the other two. Vast changes in the number, condition, and diversities of the human race had taken place during that long period of time, but the utterances are in their substance one and the same. Divine inspiration speaking in that early and that later day concerning the relations of man and woman gave the same verdict. God appointed and God determined what those relations were to be.

In the chapter from the book of Genesis which contains the first of these passages, we find the only account we possess of the origin of our race. The speculations of modern times are not reliable. Darwinism tells us that man and the lower animals came from one common germ, but no man can produce a germ: Professor Huxley acknowledges that he has not been able to produce a living germ from any mixture he has been able to make. Until our philosophers can show us a germ and can clearly demonstrate, which they fail to do, that man has descended from the lower animals; we shall be justified in declining to acknowledge the monkeys as our ancestors. Taking the account of the creation of man contained in the word of God, there are three particulars to be specially noticed,1. That woman was made the equal of man.

The book of Genesis relates, "And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness; and let him have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth. So God created man in His own image, in the image of God created He him; male and female created He them." Here equality is plainly indicated. After the account of the creation of the man, and then of the woman, we are told that Adam said, "This is now bone of my bone, and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of man. Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife; and they shall be one flesh." Here, again, the same equality is set forth; Adam recognised in the companion God had provided for him the equal of himself.

The Scripture representations on this subject deserve special remark, because it is important both for men and women to recognise the truth; and because it has often been, if not denied, forgotten and ignored. Not only in barbarous but in civilized countries, where the gospel has not exerted its power, the women have been considered and treated as the inferiors of the men. The brilliant age of Pericles, the most illustrious of Athenian statesmen, was an age when woman was dishonoured. The boasted laws of Lycurgus, the Spartan legislator, admirable in a great many respects, were an insult to her. In the East, to this day, if a man finds it necessary to speak of his wife and daughter in the presence of another, he begins always with an apology. It is a popular tradition among the Mahomedans until the present time that women shall not enter Paradise. Robert Moffat tells us that in Africa all the manual labour was performed by the wives and daughters, while the husbands and sons disported themselves as the lords of creation. The one sex was the drudge of the other. In the writings of every heathen nation which have descended to us, though there are to be found numberless panegyrics on the sex, very little can be found where woman is treated with respect. There is no want of recognition of her love, of her beauty, of her charms; but of woman as the equal of man, as a moral companion travelling with him the road to everlasting happiness, as his adviser, as his solace in misfortune, as a pattern from which he may sometimes copy with advantage, of all this there is scarcely a trace. Woman is represented as the drudge of man's indolence, and the pampered plaything of his idle hours. It were well if in Christian lands, and among our

selves, there could not be found any traces of this kind of estimate, any floating ideas of this sort. It is not a work of supererogation to point out the position the word of God assigns to woman. The Scriptures represent her not as the drudge, but as the help-meet; not as the plaything, but the companion; not as the inferior, but as the equal of man.

2. Woman, though made the equal, was made unlike to man. "God created man in His own image, in the image of God created He him; male and female created He them." Diversity of sex does not necessarily imply disparity of sex. There may be equality of material and worth where there is much difference of form and use. From the same block of marble two figures may be sculptured by the same master hand diverse in every respect, yet equally beautiful and equally valuable. From the same Creator's hand, fashioned of the same material, animated by the same breath of life, made in the same glorious image of God, came forth man, male and female.

They were unlike each other, and they were intended to be unlike each other. Their physical organization is unlike, yet is one not less wondrous than the other; nor less the product of Almighty wisdom, skill, and power. Their mental powers and dispositions are diverse; yet is the one order not less necessary and not less useful than the other. The duties which they are best fitted to discharge are different, yet is the one class not less essential to the comfort and welfare of the race than the other. If to man belong greater strength of body, powers of more close and comprehensive reasoning, and of more intense and continued application; to woman belong greater quickness of perception, fertility of invention, spright

more amiable and affecMan is most fitted to be

liness of manner, and wealth of the tionate tendencies of human nature. abroad, woman to be at home; he to be active, she to be passive; he has to go and find out his sphere in the busy world, hers usually lies immediately around her. By physical and mental endowment his place is to wield the hammer, to delve the stone, to man the ship, and to conduct enterprising mercantile and mechanical pursuits; by nature her place is to nurse the infant, to train the child, to manage the household, and to care for the home. The sphere and work of each is plainly indicated by the constitution and qualities of each. The vocations are different, yet is one as distinct, as useful, as honourable as the other; and if the mission of men and of women is to be fulfilled, each must be resolutely and efficiently discharged.

3. Woman was made equal and dissimilar, in order that she might be the complement of man.

Man was first formed, then Eve. Man was not complete until woman was made. Woman was indispensably necessary to the completion of the Divine idea of perfected manhood. There were sympathies in his heart which she was needed to awaken, and affections which she alone could call forth. Though Adam was surrounded by all that earth could yield, though he was blest with the favour and communion of his Maker, there was yet a void unfilled, and a want unsupplied. The Creator affirmed what subsequent experience has abundantly proved, that "it is not good for man to be alone." Man needed one who could be a constant companion; who, by sharing, would halve the sorrows and double the joys of life; and who would supply the qualities