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    4 THE OPINIONS OF JOHN STUART MILL.

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    , , Whe There Ther Is It No Be Name At O...

    whether men or woxnen , can close these two volumes without holding have a no more more reasonable space to view spar of e this for the and " all Log other ic / 7 questions having : shown . But that we

    the greatest logician has openly and strongly declared his opinion . Now let us see what we can find in the " Principles of Political

    Economy , with some of their Applications to Social Philosophy . " This book is to that science what the work on logic is to logicthe

    , longest and most complete treatise in our language . Here we find so much to extract that is interesting , that we are fain to content

    ourselves by saying , that this book is much less difficult to understand than the logic , and we most earnestly desire that every young

    woman might read it . With the exception of the chapters on currency and the calculation of chancesthere is nothing which a well

    educated girl of eighteen or twenty , would not enjoy mastering . Political Economy is to the nation what domestic economy is to

    the distribution family ; the including subject of directl this y science or remotel is _"^ y _Wealth the _oj , its _^ eration production of all and the

    causes by which , the condition of mankind or of any society of human beings in respect of this universal object of human desire is

    made prosperous or the reverse . " This science bears directly on all hilanthropic efforts ; and as women take so large a share in these

    movements p , it is their plain duty to study scientifically the laws of national wellbeing . For in spite of all their goodheartedness , if

    they do not also throw some hardheadedness into these questions , they are apt to do more harm than good in their work . The chapter in

    the first volume on wages , and on remedies for low wages , we would particularly point out as bearing on philanthropy—Mr . Mill distinctly

    declares his opinion , that the inferior position and helpless submissionwhich "working women hold and show in regard to working

    men , is one of the reasons of the misery and poverty of the lower classes , . And in the following chapter , on the difference of wages

    in different employments , he treats of the peculiar difficulties which beset the introduction of women into trades , because their labor is

    apt to contain an amateur element which interferes with the uniform scale of wages . Female workers are constantly in the same position

    as literary men ; they possess some other means of livelihood , more or less sufficient . Thus they are willing to work for less than the

    amp absolute le is found market in the value excessive of what cheapness they produce of the . spinning An immediate 1 and knitting

    exdone by the families of agricultural laborers ; the wives and daughters will work for anything rather than be quite unable to add to the

    small family resources ; though , were they wholly dependent ' on their own laborthey would be forced to ask a higher priceor go

    to the workhouse , ; but as a matter o _£ actual fact , they ivould , get a hiher price if forced to demand itsince the other alternative , death

    from g want of the necessaries of , lifeis an outrage which society , inevitably redresses when it is discovered to exist .

    4 The Opinions Of John Stuart Mill.

    4 THE OPINIONS OF JOHN STUART MILL .

• Citation
  • English Woman’s Journal (1858-1864), Sept. 1, 1860, page 4, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/ewj/issues/ewj_01091860/page/4/