Eighty Years and More; Reminiscences 1815-1897
been my special life work, it would have been more appropriate if the
celebration had been under the auspices of the National Woman's Suffrage
Association.
Mrs. Mary Lowe Dickinson, President of the National Council of Women,
assumed the financial responsibility and the extensive correspondence
involved, and with rare tact, perseverance, and executive ability made
the celebration a complete success. In describing this occasion I cannot
do better than to reproduce, in part, Mrs. Dickinson's account,
published in _The Arena_:
"In the month of June, 1895, the National Council of Women issued the
following invitation:
"'Believing that the progress made by women in the last half century may
be promoted by a more general notice of their achievements, we propose
to hold, in New York city, a convention for this purpose. As an
appropriate time for such a celebration, the eightieth birthday of
Elizabeth Cady Stanton has been chosen. Her half century of pioneer work
for the rights of women makes her name an inspiration for such an
occasion and her life a fitting object for the homage of all women.
"'This National Council is composed of twenty organizations; these and
all other societies interested are invited to co-operate in grateful
recognition of the debt the present generation owes to the pioneers of
the past. From their interest in the enfranchisement of women, the
influence of Mrs. Stanton and her coadjutor, Miss Anthony, has permeated
all departments of progress and made them a common center round which
all interested in woman's higher development may gather.'
"To this invitation came responses, from the Old World and the New,
expressing sympathy with the proposed celebration, which was intended to
emphasize a great principle by showing the loftiness of character that
had resulted from its embodiment in a unique personality. The world
naturally thinks of the personality before it thinks of the principle.
It has, at least, so much unconscious courtesy left as to honor a noble
woman, even when failing to rightly apprehend a noble cause. To afford
this feeling its proper expression, to render more tangible all vague
sympathy, to crystallize the growing sentiment in favor of human
freedom, to give youth the opportunity to reverence the glory of age, to
give hearts their utterances in word and song was perhaps the most
popular purpose of the reunion. In other words, it gave an opportunity
for those who revered Mrs. Stanton as a queen among women to show their
reverence, and to recognize the work her life had wrought, and to see in
it an epitome of the progress of a century.
"The celebration was also an illustration of the distinctive idea of the
National Council of Women, which aims to give recognition to all human
effort without demanding uniformity of opinion as a basis of
co-operation. It claims to act upon a unity of service, notwithstanding
differences of creed and methods. The things that separate, shrank back
into the shadows where they belong, and all hearts brave enough to
think, and tender enough to feel, found it easy to unite in homage to a
life which had known a half century of struggle to lift humanity from
bondage and womanhood from shame.
"This reunion was the first general recognition of the debt the present
owes to the past. It was the first effort to show the extent to which
later development has been inspired and made possible by the freedom to
think and work claimed in that earlier time by women like Lucretia Mott,
Lucy Stone, Mrs. Stanton, and many others whose names stand as synonyms
of noble service for the race. To those who looked at the reunion from
this point of view it could not fail of inspiration.
"For the followers in lines of philanthropic work to look in the faces
and hear the voices of women like Clara Barton and Mary Livermore; for
the multitude enlisted in the crowded ranks of literature to feel in the
living presence, what literature owes to women like Julia Ward Howe; for
the white ribbon army to turn from its one great leader of to-day whose
light, spreading to the horizon, does not obscure or dim the glory of
the crusade leaders of the past; for art lovers and art students to
call to mind sculptors like Harriet Hosmer and Anna Whitney, and
remember the days when art was a sealed book to women; for the followers
of the truly divine art of healing to honor the Blackwell sisters and
the memory of Mme. Clemence Lozier; for the mercy of surgery to reveal
itself in the face of Dr. Cushier, who has proved for us that heart of
pity and hand of skill need never be divorced; for women lifting their
eyes to meet the face of Phebe A. Hanaford and Anna Shaw and other women
who to-day in the pulpit, as well as out of it, may use a woman's right
to minister to needy souls; for the ofttime sufferers from unrighteous
law to welcome women lawyers; for the throng of working women to read
backward through the story of four hundred industries to their beginning
in the 'four,' and remember that each new door had opened because some
women toiled and strove; for all these the exercises were a part of a
great thanksgiving paean, each phase of progress striking its own chord,
and finding each its echo in the hearts that held it dear.
"To the student of history, or to him who can read the signs of the
times, there was such a profound significance in this occasion as makes
one shrink from dwelling too much upon the external details. Yet as a
pageant only it was a most inspiring sight, and one truly worthy of a
queen. Indeed as we run the mind back over the pages of history, what
queen came to a more triumphant throne in the hearts of a grateful
people? What woman ever before sat silver-crowned, canopied with
flowers, surrounded not by servile followers but by men and women who
brought to her court the grandest service they had wrought, their best
thought crystallized in speech and song. Greater than any triumphal
procession that ever marked a royal passage through a kingdom was it to
know that in a score or more of cities, in many a village church on that
same night festive fires were lighted, and the throng kept holiday,
bringing for tribute not gold and gems but noblest aspirations, truest
gratitude, and highest ideals for the nation and the race.
"The great meeting was but one link in a chain; yet with its thousands
of welcoming faces, with its eloquence of words, with its offering of
sweetest song from the children of a race that once was bound but now is
free, with its pictured glimpses of the old time and the new flashing
out upon the night, with the home voices offering welcome and gratitude
and love, with numberless greetings, from the great, true, brave souls
of many lands, it was indeed a wonderful tribute, worthy of the great
warm heart of a nation that offered it, and worthy of the woman so
revered.
"It seemed fitting that Mme. Antoinette Sterling, who, twenty years ago,
took her wonderful voice away to England, where it won for her a unique
place in the hearts of the nation, should, on returning to her country,
give her first service to the womanhood of her native land. 'I am coming
a week earlier,' so she had written, 'that my first work in my own
beloved America may be done for women. I am coming as a woman and not as
an artist, and because I so glory in that which the women of my country
have achieved.' So when she sang out of her heart, 'O rest in the Lord;
wait patiently for him!' no marvel that it seemed to lift all listening
hearts to a recognition of the divine secret and source of power for all
work.
"One charming feature of the entertainment was a series of pictures
called 'Then and Now,' each illustrating the change in woman's condition
during the last fifty years. And after this, upon the dimness there
shone out, one after another, the names of noble women like Mary Lyon,
Maria Mitchell, Emma Willard, and many others who have passed away. Upon
the shadows and the silence broke Mme. Sterling's voice in Tennyson's
'Crossing the Bar.' And when this was over, as with one voice, the whole
audience sang softly 'Auld Lang Syne.'
"And last but not least should be mentioned the greetings that poured in
a shower of telegrams and letters from every section of the country, and
many from over the sea. These expressions, not only of personal
congratulation for Mrs. Stanton, but utterances of gladness for the
progress in woman's life and thought, for the conditions, already so
much better than in the past, and for the hope for the future, would
make of themselves a most interesting and wonderful chapter. Among them
may be mentioned letters from Lord and Lady Aberdeen, from Lady Henry
Somerset and Frances E. Willard, from Canon Wilberforce, and many
others, including an address from thirty members of the family of John
Bright, headed by his brother, the Right Honorable Jacob Bright; a
beautifully engrossed address, on parchment, from the National Woman
Suffrage Society of Scotland, an address from the London Women's
Franchise League, and a cablegram from the Bristol Women's Liberal
Association; a letter from the Women's Rights Society of Finland, signed
by its president, Baroness Gripenberg of Helsingfors; telegrams from the
California Suffrage Pioneers; and others from the Chicago Woman's Club,
from the Toledo and Ohio Woman's Suffrage Society, from the son of the
Rev. Dr. William Ellery Channing, and a telegram and letter from
citizens and societies of Seneca Falls, New York, accompanied with
flowers and many handsome pieces of silver from the different societies.
There were also letters from Hon. Oscar S. Strauss, ex-minister to
Turkey, Miss Ellen Terry, and scores of others. An address was received
from the Women's Association of Utah, accompanied by a beautiful onyx
and silver ballot box; and from the Shaker women of Mount Lebanon came
an ode; a solid silver loving cup from the New York City Suffrage
League, presented on the platform with a few appropriate words by its
President, Mrs. Devereux Blake.
"Hundreds of organizations and societies, both in this country and
abroad, wished to have their names placed on record as in sympathy with
the movement. Many organizations were present in a body, and one was
reminded, by the variety and beauty of the decorations of their boxes,
of the Venetian Carnival, as the occupants gazed down from amid the
silken banners and the flowers, upon the throng below. The whole
occasion was indeed a unique festival, unique in its presentation, as
well as in its purpose, plan, character, and spirit. No woman present
could fail to be impressed with what we owe to the women of the past,
and especially to this one woman who was the honored guest of the
occasion. And no young woman could desire to forget the picture of this
aged form as, leaning upon her staff, Mrs. Stanton spoke to the great
audience of over six thousand, as she had spoken hundreds of times
before in legislative halls, and whenever her word could influence the
popular sentiment in favor of justice for all mankind."
My birthday celebration, with all the testimonials of love and
friendship I received, was an occasion of such serious thought and deep
feeling as I had never before experienced. Having been accustomed for
half a century to blame rather than praise, I was surprised with such a
manifestation of approval; I could endure any amount of severe criticism
with complacency, but such an outpouring of homage and affection stirred
me profoundly. To calm myself during that week of excitement, I thought
many times of Michelet's wise motto, "Let the weal and woe of humanity
be everything to you, their praise and blame of no effect; be not puffed
up with the one nor cast down with the other."
Naturally at such a time I reviewed my life, its march and battle on the