“The test of civilization is the estimate of woman," said George William Curtis; and these closing days of this century present many proofs of the truthfulness of this utterance.
The present is certainly woman's hour in a larger, purer, sense than that of any previous epoch of human history. It is especially pregnant with evidence of her coming emancipation from all that limits her mental growth, and her position in the world socially, civilly, and religiously. Through clouds of bigotry, literalism, custom and selfishness we get inspiring glimpses of that glorified hour when woman will stand in the world for what she is, and for what the All-Father meant her to be.
For centuries she has almost unaided fought her own battles, won her victories in the closet, alone with her God, and has become the happy possessor of enlarged privileges and greater possibilities, only as the thought of the race has been exalted and spiritualized, by the influx of light and purity from on High.
