Harriet Martineau
Worthington before their love was allowed to be declared, and their
engagement was permitted--a long period for hope and fear to do their
painful office in the soul, a long test of the reality of the love on
both sides.
Her extensive and deep studies, her sufferings and inward strivings
from her deafness, and the joys and anxieties of her love, were the
chief moulding influences of her early womanhood. We shall soon see
how she came to seek expression for the results of all these in
literature.
CHAPTER III.
EARLIEST WRITINGS.
Harriet Martineau's first attempt to write for publication was made in
the same year that her acquaintance with Mr. Worthington was formed; in
1822, when she was twenty years old. It was, apparently, at the close
of the vacation in which Worthington had visited his friend Martineau
at Norwich, that she commenced a paper with the design of offering it
to the Unitarian magazine, _The Monthly Repository_. She had told James
that when he had returned to college she should be miserable, and he
had, with equal kindness and sense, advised her to try to forget her
feelings about the parting by an attempt at authorship. On a bright
September morning, therefore, when she had seen him start by the early
coach, soon after six, she sat down in her own room with a supply of
foolscap paper before her to write her first article.
The account which she--writing from memory--gives in her autobiography,
of this little transaction, is curiously inaccurate, as far as the
trifling details are concerned. Her own statement is that she took
the letter "V" for her signature, and that she found her paper
printed in the next number of the magazine, "and in the 'Notices to
Correspondents' a request to hear more from 'V' of Norwich." Her little
errors about these facts must be corrected, because the truth of the
matter is at once suggestive and amusing.
The article may be found in the _Monthly Repository_ for October, 1822.
It is signed, not "V," but "Discipulus." This, it need hardly be
pointed out, is the _masculine_ form of the Latin for learner, or
apprentice. The note in the correspondents' column is not in that same
month's magazine; but in the number for the succeeding month, the
editor says in his answers to correspondents: "The continuation of
'Discipulus' has come to hand. _His_ other proposed communications will
probably be acceptable." If more proofs than these were required that
the youthful authoress had presented herself to her editor in a manly
disguise, it would be furnished by a passage in one of these
"Discipulus" articles, in which she definitely figures herself as a
masculine writer, speaking of "our sex" (_i.e._ the male sex) as a man
would do. The interesting fact is thus disclosed that Harriet Martineau
adds another to the group of the most eminent women writers of this
century who thought it necessary to assume the masculine sex in order
to obtain a fair hearing and an impartial judgment for their earliest
work. Surely, as our "Discipulus" takes her place in this list with
George Eliot, George Sand, and Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell, a great
deal is disclosed to us about how women in the past have had to make
their way to recognition _against the tide_ of public opinion.
That first printed essay is interesting because it was the precursor
of so long a course of literary work, rather than for itself. Yet it
is not without its own interest, and is very far indeed from being the
crude, imperfect performance of the ordinary amateur. The subject is
"Female Writers of Practical Divinity." Here are the first words that
Harriet Martineau uttered through the press:
"I do not know whether it has been remarked by others as well as
myself, that some of the finest and most useful English works on the
subject of practical Divinity are by female authors. I suppose it is
owing to the peculiar susceptibility of the female mind, and its
consequent warmth of feeling, that its productions, when they are
really valuable, find a more ready way to the heart than those of the
other sex; and it gives me great pleasure to see women gifted with
superior talents applying those talents to promote the cause of
religion and virtue."
There is nothing remarkable in the literary form of this first
article. How soon she came to have a style of her own, vivid,
stirring, and instinct with a powerful individuality, may have been
gathered already from the quotations given in our last chapter. But in
her first paper the style is coldly correct; imitative of good but
severe models, and displaying none of the writer's individuality. Two
points as regards the matter of the essay are of special interest, and
thoroughly characteristic. It is interesting, in the first place, to
know that she who was destined to do probably more than any other one
woman of her century for the enlargement of the sphere of her sex in
the field of letters, should have written her first article on the
subject of the capacity of women to teach through their writings. The
second point worth noticing is that her idea of "practical Divinity"
is simply, good conduct. Theological disputation and dogma do not
disturb her pages. Her view of practical Divinity is that it teaches
morals; and it is largely because the women to whose writings she
draws attention have occupied themselves with the attempt to trace out
rules of conduct, that she is interested in their writings, and
rejoices in their labors. Indeed, she only alludes once to the
opinions on dogmatic theology of the writers whom she quotes, and then
she does it only to put aside with scorn the idea that morality and
teaching should be rejected because of differences upon points of
theology.
Encouraged by the few stately words with which the editor of the
_Repository_ had received the offer of more contributions, "Discipulus"
continued his literary labors, and the result appeared in a paper on
"Female Education," published in the _Monthly Repository_ of February,
1823. This is a noble and powerful appeal for the higher education of
girls and the full development of all the powers of our sex. It is
written with gentleness and tact, but it courageously asserts and
demands much that was strange indeed to the tone of that day, though it
has become quite commonplace in ours.
The author (supposed to be a man, be it remembered,) disclaimed any
intention of proving that the minds of women were equal to those of
men, but only desired to show that what little powers the female
intellect might possess should be fully cultivated. Nevertheless, the
fact was pointed out that women had seldom had a chance of showing how
near they might be able to equal men intellectually, for while the lad
was at the higher school and college, preparing his mind for a future,
"the girl is probably confined to low pursuits, her aspirings after
knowledge are subdued, she is taught to believe that solid information
is unbecoming her sex; almost her whole time is expended on low
accomplishments, and thus, before she is sensible of her powers, they
are checked in their growth and chained down to mean objects, to rise
no more; and when the natural consequences of this mode of treatment
are seen, all mankind agree that the abilities of women are far
inferior to those of men." Having shown reasons to believe that women
would take advantage of higher opportunities if such were allowed
them, "Discipulus" maintained in detail that the cultivation of their
minds would improve them for all the accepted feminine duties of life,
charitable, domestic and social, and that the consequent elevation of
the female character would react beneficially on the male; cited the
works of a cluster of eminent authoresses, as showing that women could
think upon "the noblest subjects that can exercise the human mind;"
and closed with the following paragraph, wherein occurred the phrases
by which it is shown that our "Discipulus" of twenty is masquerading
as a man, more decisively even than by the termination of the Latin
_nom de guerre_:
"I cannot better conclude than with the hope that these examples of
what may be done may excite a noble emulation in _their own_ sex, and
in _ours_ such a conviction of the value of the female mind, as shall
overcome _our_ long-cherished prejudices, and induce _us_ to give _our_
earnest endeavors to the promotion of _women's_ best interests."
It is most interesting to thus discover that Harriet Martineau's first
writings were upon that "woman question" which she lived to see make
such wonderful advances, and which she so much forwarded, both by her
direct advocacy, and by the indirect influence of the proof which she
afforded, that a woman may be a thinker upon high topics and a teacher
and leader of men in practical politics, and yet not only be
irreproachable in her private life, but even show herself throughout
it, in the best sense, truly feminine.
Harriet contributed nothing more to the _Monthly Repository_ after this
(so far as can now be ascertained), for a considerable time. Encouraged
by the success of her first attempts with periodicals, she commenced a
book of a distinctly religious character, which was issued in the
autumn of the same year, 1823, by Hunter, of St. Paul's Churchyard.
The little volume was published anonymously. Its title-page runs thus:
"_Devotional Exercises_; consisting of Reflections and Prayers for the
use of Young Persons. To which is added an Address on Baptism. By a
lady."
The character of the work is perhaps sufficiently indicated by the
title. But it would be a mistake to suppose that the book is a
commonplace one. It contains a good deal of dogmatism and many
platitudes. It contains, likewise, however, many a noble thought and
many a high aspiration, expressed in words equally flowing and fervent.
A "Reflection" (something like a short sermon) and a prayer are
supplied for each morning and each evening of the seven days of the
week. She had already attained to such an insight into the human mind
as to recognize that religious devotion is an exercise of the emotions.
Proof, too, is given in this little work of the fullness with which she
realized that true religion must be expressed by service to mankind; to
those nearest to one first, and afterwards to others; and indeed, that
a high sense of social duty, with a fervent and unselfish devotion to
it, _is_ religion, rather than either the spiritual dram-drinking, or
the dogmatic irrationality to which that name of high import is
frequently applied.
The prayers in this little volume differ much from the supplications
for personal benefits which are commonly called prayers.
These are rather aspirations, or meditations. The highest moral
attributes, personified in God, are held up for the worship of the
imperfect human creature, with fervent aspiration to approach as
nearly as possible towards that light of unsullied goodness.
The lack of petitions for material benefits which appears in these
"Devotions" was by no means unconscious, instinctive, or accidental.
She had deliberately given up the practice of praying for personal
benefits, partly because she held that, since it is impossible for us
to foresee how far our highest interests may be served or hindered by
changes in our external circumstances, it is not for us to attempt to
indicate, or even to form a desire, as to what those circumstances
shall be. As regarded the emotional side of her religion, she had come
to prefer to leave herself and her fate to the unquestioned direction
of a higher power.
But there was more than this in it. In her philosophical studies, she
had, of course, met with the eternal debates of metaphysicians and
theologians on Foreknowledge, Fate, and Freedom of the Will. The