exercise the power of restriction, to a dependency of one class of citizenship upon another. If then the principle announced in the declaration of our national rights, was not in its origin conceived to be but "glitter. ing generalities," sent abroad to arrest the world by its metallic sound rather than by its intonations of truth, then must we claim that the consent of the governed should be secured, as well of woman as of man, in giving tone and legislative dignity to the insiitutions and laws of ourr land. If taxation and representation was an indivisible problem which required too great national powers to solve, then must the triumph of the American Revolution come to our rescue in the defence of the indissoluble rights which politically connect the governed with those who govern. Woman, then, in the possession of her citizenship, acknowledging her allegiance, and subjecting herself to the legislation of the land, clearly and undeniably acquires the right of participation in the structure of all legislative authority. We scarcely declare this position ere we hear ringing from the "Lords of creation" the self-evincing" but hackneyed inference that their plenitude of experience authorizes men to wield those powers, which a natural organism incapacitates woman for self control. This claim requires no better refutation than the tenacity with which the right of control is carefully guarded and exercised.

It would be far below the dignity of true manhood to allow "invidious comparisons" to deter him from awarding a just measure of capacity to a meritorious class because such concession might derogate from man's elevated entrenchment. It is a common observation that the "book worm" will forever confine his sinuosities within the covers of his favorite authors, unless by some means he is led to view his acquisitions from a different stand point; where the light of practical experience may clear up and invigorate the mist of his mental seclusion. No less true is it that in the graduation of mental endowment and intellectual acquirements practical life is a more reliable umpire than any mental or scholastic assumption. In forming an estimate of the respective sexes, their claims to intellectual superiority can only be justly weighed in the light of a liberal access to every attainment for the one, and a restricted field for the development of the other. With this allowance we shrink not from a comparison. Were we permitted the

tify the position we claim. In the light of genuine courage and elevation of soul, who will disown the unexampled fortitude of those noble matrons, who, charging their warrior sons with the high responsibility of a "country's mission," cut short their lingering adieu with the imperishable injunction, "Let victory crown your valor, or Spartan shields return you the lifeless trophies of your renown"? In legislative and executive relations, CATHARINE of Russia and ELIZABETH of England started prosperous epochs in their national capacities. Logical and metaphysical research cannot boast of more ardent champions than MADAM DESTAEL and MARGARET FULLER. Where will you find the most fastidious artist, whose life of skill has not failed to awaken him to that musical inspiration which first enraptured his soul at the spirituelle of JENNY LIND? In the light of genuine humanity, who will compare with the indefatigable zeal and charitable labors of a JUDSON or NIGHTINGALE, who, denying the pleasures and luxuries of a blissful nativity, have immortalized their sympathies with Indian and Crimean fame?

The literary world would tread its endless cycles with only the light of its principal orbs, without the brilliant retinue, whose reflections through FERN and GREENWOOD leaves, point upward and invest the peesy of nature with the shining stars of HEMANS and SIGOUrney. The boundaries of EPIC and EPISODE will never find their measure until the pens of STOWE and SOUTHWORTH cease to descry their limit. The wings of the press are weaving their undulations with outward vigor, but less of inward current, when shorn of the vitalizing sanctums of a SWISSHELM or BLOOMER. The itinerant lore which the lecturing of these latter days is spreading broadcast throughout our intelligent land, is invigorating its logic and beautifying its rhetoric with the harmonious diction of E. ОAKES SMITH and LUCY STONE. While the clerical profession is enriching its doctrines with all of the spiritual pathos and stirring appeals of an ANTOINETTE BROWN, whose emotional sex peculiarly fits such for inspiring the soul with a heavenly relish.

Amid this paucity of allusion to female intellect, who are historizing the progress of the world, the objection to their want of capacity will doubtless be waived, while we hasten to the last, greatest but least fortification of the nobler sex. The argument with all the gravity of its authority s submitted; that the opening of the door to political ac

tion for an indiscriminate entrance of both sexes would allow an interference with the varied relations of man, and seriously jeopardize his present ascendancy. We take exceptions to such untenable ground. The author of nature in all the ramifications of his creation has exhibited the perfection of his handiwork, by the masterly manner in which he has blended characteristics to establish the peculiar identity of each distinctive object. Together with this matchless arrangement has he instituted his law to regulate and control the existence and interchange of such numerous progeny. To one is given magnitude, another solidity, thence tenacity, another vigorous activity, and another listless inertia. Force to one, subjection to another, athletic proportions here and delicacy of organism there; angular exterior to this and beautiful symmetry to that; attraction to one and repulsion to another; life beauty and power, with vitality everywhere; and yet no dogmatical distinctions, restrictive enforcements and authoritative compulsions surround this wonderful system of organism; but everything is left to the free exercise of its own peculiarities and harmony, and just appreciation follows the fiat of order reigning through the vast universe of associated and personal identity. Nature presents its bold and angular objects with all of the nobler lines of rock, mountain, hill and granite pile, yet amid all of such rigid aspect, spring up wood-bine and sward, foliage and flower, fountain, rivulet and sea, to beautify and complete the Eeach has its own peculiarities, but with unrestricted existence, and yet all necessary to each other in the perfection of the whole. Relations of life therefore should be so adjusted as to leave personal identity to develop spontaneously its own forces of nature, and thus occupy just such positions as congenital qualifications must command. Law should be instituted for no other purpose than to establish a relative equality and to secure the most perfect development and complete happiness of each and every subject; and man fails to imitate the Supreme Legislative authority, and falls far below the high demands of his nature, when he neglects to recognise for others that which he claims for himself.

scene.

It is an unavoidable concession which we are forced to avow; that to preserve our ascendant relation we are driven to the necessity of fortify.

which we arrive, when restrictions are exercised to derogate from the rightful equality of others. The light of truth never wanes by contact with error; crushed to earth she rises again, burnished with the friction of conflict. The great natural law written upon the natures of the sexes will without the weak resort to human legislation clearly and distinctively apportion the relations which they are to hold to each other. The vigorous and rigid combination of man, will lead the delicate, but finely adjusted organism of woman, as of natural consequence, without the humiliating contingency of legal enactment. Step openly into the field of human endeavor, and if man fails to establish his pre-eminent qualifications for intellectual ascendancy, then let him take the point upon the scale of human progression which his powers accord him, and let mind in whaver casket it be formed, assume the functions of its nature.

Mind will seek its own congenial place. Let reinforcement therefore spring from hope, not law, and if need be, "resolution from despair." Let not the wail of "interference" dethrone the judgment. Woman never will assume the special offices of man and conversely the same is equally true. An irrevocable law forbids it. Their several spheres are as distinct as the great lights of the solar system, and each to the other, as necessary, for the perfect regularity of its evolutions. The Sun inducts the day of project, discovery and national wealth; the Moon illumines the night with its mysterious depths and sparkling treasures.

Woman will no more revel amid the troublous conflict of man's nerveless life, than He will seek to profanate the inner sanctuary of her peculiar sphere. Give her the exercise of a share in political will, and into that arena will she transfuse a portion of her humanizing nature. The contact with man in this relation will no more interrupt the play of all her delicate sensibilities, than does her present relation serve to assuage the gush of earnest sympathy which emanates and permeates the endless intricacies of humanity. Michigan has, in one regard, awakened to the disparity which the sexes hold in a pecuniary point of view. She hurls from her brow that relic of tyranny and barbarism which consigns all of woman's possessions to the shuttle of human calamity, by which her sustenance is to be eked out at the measure of her years. Let this initiatory step be followed by a surrender of all the legal disabilities which encumber her dignity as a State. Then like the refreshing exhalations which invest the sea, spreading like clouds of prolific wing over

the territory of animate life, and shedding their genial dews to irrigate and enrich the mind, the "better half" of nature will rise like morning incense to immortalize the perpetuity of Michigan's proud fame.

In the submission of this, together with a resolution in consonance therewith, we ask to be relinquished from the further consideration of the subject, commending the whole to the just and dignified regard of the Honorable Senate.

THOMAS W. FERRY.