LITMIR.BIZ

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anatomy and medicine until she had gained "a surprizing knowledge of the human body, and of the Materia Medica," so that she could state the symptoms of the most difficult and intricate cases in the physician's own terms. She learned French that she might talk with French refugees to whom she was a benefactress. Her correspondence and conversation were both highly prized. But all these interests must be counted merely as diversions. "Her constant favourite and darling study was divinity." The Bible, Mr. Henry's Annotations, a few works on practical divinity, and a competent number of Hebrew books made up her working library. Hebrew because of its scriptural importance was the subject on which she concentrated her attention and she was reputed to have a critical knowledge of its idioms and peculiarities. It was said that she could even quote the original in common conversation if the elucidation of some text were in question. As the years passed, books and writing, "morning hours with God," and many arduous charitable duties so fully occupied her that she found mere social life an unrewarded tax. Of ordinary conversation she said that though one might strike fire "it always fell on wet tinder." The mass of manuscripts found after her death reflected the variety of her interests, but the majority were on topics such as Meditations on the Divinity of the Holy Scriptures, The unreasonableness of Fretting against God, and similar subjects. She kept also a voluminous Diary, an abridgment of which was published by her husband in Bristol in 1721. Mr. Watts's Elegy indicates something of the reverence with which Mrs. Bury was regarded by her contemporaries; and a woman of her personal charm, executive ability, alert responsiveness to the calls of charity, along with her quick mind, and multifarious, if not always profound, learning would take an even higher place in any organized community to-day.

      Susanna Hopton (1627–1709)

      Women also entered the less feminine fields of controversy. Susanna Hopton is an interesting example. In her youth she had become a Catholic, but under the influence of her husband she entered upon a thorough study of the points at issue between the Catholics and the Protestants. Dr. Hickes says of her: "She made herself as perfect in the controversie, as English writers could make her, who managed the controversie on both sides. I have (says he) above twenty popish authors, which she left me, and some of them with marginal notes in her own hand. She was well versed in Bishop Moreton's, Archbishop Laud's and Mr. Chillingworth's works, and Ranchin's Review of the Council of Trent, etc."[154] As a result of this reading she drew up a long and learned letter to Father Tuberville, showing him why she had renounced the Church of Rome. This letter was published by Dr. Hickes immediately after her death in his volume of Controversial Letters in 1710. Mr. William said that she was an excellent casuist and divine, and could encounter and confute all enemies of the church. "Her discourse and stile upon serious matters was strong, eloquent and nervous; upon pleasant subjects, witty and facetious: and when it required an edge was sharp as a razor." Daily Devotions, Meditations on the Six Days Of Creation, and Meditations on the Life of Christ were her other works. As a wife, a neighbor, and a friend she seems to have been in high esteem, but her life had the church as its center.

      Damaris Cudworth, Lady Masham (1658–1708)

      Damaris Cudworth and Mary Astell, two of the most gifted women of the period, became involved in the theological discussion between John Norris and John Locke. Miss Cudworth knew both disputants well. As a young woman she had corresponded with Norris on the subject of "Platonic Love," and in 1689 he had dedicated to her his Reflections upon the Conduct of Human Life, with reference to the study of learning and knowledge. But it was Locke who had a permanent influence on her opinions. While she was still in Cambridge with her father, Ralph Cudworth, Locke taught her divinity and philosophy. After her marriage to Sir Francis Masham in 1685, Locke was a frequent visitor at their home, and from 1691 till his death in 1704 he lived permanently with them. Her polemical articles were doubtless written under his inspiration. In 1694 the correspondence between Mary Astell and John Norris was published, under the title, Letters concerning the Love of God. Two years later Lady Masham answered their arguments in her Discourse concerning the Love of God,[155] which was attributed to Locke and answered by Norris. In 1700 Lady Masham published Occasional Thoughts in reference to a virtuous Christian Life, which is her closing word in the controversy.

      Damaris Cudworth was a woman of remarkable intellect. Her father was delighted with the early manifestations of her power and he took pride in securing for her the best possible education. The curious epitaph on her tomb praises her learning, judgment, candor, penetration, and love of truth, and credits her with being a devoted and intelligent mother. It sums up her character in the statement, that "to the Softness and Elegancy of her own Sex" she added "several of the noblest Accomplishments and Qualities of the other," and that "she possessed these advantages in a degree unusual to either." The conventional eulogy on a tomb is always open to suspicion, but in this case the vague generalities of the epitaph fall below the truth. Locke, in a letter to Phillipp van Limborch, said of her: "The Lady herself is so well versed in theological and philosophical studies and of such an original mind that you will not find many men to whom she is not superior in wealth of knowledge and ability to profit by it. Her judgment is excellent, and I know few who can bring such clearness of thought to bear upon the most abstruse subjects, or such capacity for searching through and solving the difficulties. I do not say of most women, but even of most learned men."[156]

      Lady Masham was also recognized as one of the early champions for woman's education, for when Mary Astell's Serious Proposal appeared anonymously in 1694 it was by some attributed to Lady Masham. She took the subject up definitely in her Occasional Thoughts. After commenting on the lack of knowledge of science, law, history, politics, morals, and religion, of most English gentlemen, Lady Masham continued:

      Thus wretchedly destitute of all that Knowledge which they ought to have, are, generally speaking, our English gentlemen, and being so, what wonder can it be, if they like not that women should have knowledge; for this is a quality that will give some sort of superiority even to those who care not to have it? … But such men as these would assuredly find their account much better therein, if tenderness of that prerogative would teach them a more legitimate way of maintaining it, than such a one as is a very great impediment or discouragement at the least, to others in the doing what God requires of them. For it is an undesirable truth that a lady who is able to give an account of her faith, and to defend her religion against the attacks of the cavilling wits of the age, or the abuses of the obtruders of vain opinions: that is capable of instructing her children in the reasonableness of the christian religion, and of laying in them the foundations of a solid virtue: that a lady, I say, no more knowing than this does demand, can hardly escape being called learned by the men of our days, and in consequence thereof, becoming a subject of ridicule to one part of them, and of aversion to the other; with but a few exceptions of some virtuous and rational persons. And is not the incurring of general dislike one of the strongest discouragements we can have to any thing?[157]

      Grace Norton, Lady Gethin (1676–1696)

      There was published soon after Lady Gethin's death, from loose papers left by her, a work entitled Reliquiæ Gethinianæ. Congreve's poem, entitled Verses to the Memory of Lady Grace Gethin, occasioned by reading her Book, speaks in high praise of her. He says the book shows all that study or time could teach.

      But to what height must his amazement rise,

      When, having read the work, he turns his eyes

      Again to view the foremost opening page,

      And there the beauty, sex, and tender age,

      Of her beholds, in whose pure mind arose

      Th' ethereal source, from whence the current flows.

      Lady Gethin was counted a marvel of wisdom, but when we read her Apothegms and Essays and Witty Sayings we are more impressed by her accurate memory of Bacon and other earlier essayists than by any profound knowledge of life on her own part.

      Mrs. Eleanor James (fl. 1685–1715)

      Mrs. Eleanor James[158] was a writer on religious and political topics. No complete list of her works has ever been compiled. She gained publicity for her religious views by numerous single printed sheets between 1685 and 1715. John Dunton described her husband as being well known because he was an excellent printer, and "something the better known for being the husband of that

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