L E T T E R S

258the plan of instruction drawn up by the eloquent doctors of the new religion, toopen the eyes of women, and to expose their really degraded and unhappysocial condition. Slaves of the privileged classes or unprivileged.Women are always slaves and as such they are to be the principal andconstant agents in perpetuating the evils that so deeply afflict humanity. Iwished that Mr. Owen would not neglect this point of the greatest importancein the whole project of social improvement. Because no improvement ispossible without their cooperation. But I suppose he feared that such a thingwould shock the ugly prejudice of the people whose brute animalism is not yetredeemed by a single spark of soul and feeling and whose intelligence is onlyattracted by selfish individualism. As a result the intellectual and moralimprovement is a subject proscribed; it is not with impunity that a rnan, andstill more so, a woman, dare talk about it. The English put all their conifidencein small political reforms and would not accept happiness based on a widebase. And nevertheless it cannot be obtained otherwise.I see by the last publications, which I have just received and which youwere kind enough to send me, that the doubts stated in that letter as regards thegeneral adoption of your sublime religion have almost all been cleared up. Thetrue meaning of the word religion appears to have been understood up to nowonly for the purpose of retaining our unknown social justifications. It wasdeemed well to make of it a mystery for the people and the women. Humanity,subject to a common destiny, a physical fate such as it is, requires anotherbond if it is to be up to fulfilling its moral, intellectual and social goal. Thisbond, when it includes God and when the justifications are not opposed to itspractical results, is expressed very happily by the word religion. But at presentthis word is a dead letter and still worse a superstition.I am accustomed to thinking that good justifications (which include agood education) cannot fail to produce in the whole rake the finest features.And if such justifications are ever established, the word (religion) will then bewithout meaning, its contact will have no meaning, no bond with the divine