"I say that woman is not the author of this sentiment against her fallen sister, and I roll back the assertion on its source. Having the public ear one-seventh part of the time, if the men of the pulpit do not educate the public mind, who does educate it? Millions of dollars are paid for this education, and if they do not educate the public mind in its morals, what, I ask, are we paying our money for? If woman is cast out of society, and man is placed in a position where he is respected, then I charge upon the pulpit that it has been recreant to its duty. If the pulpit should speak out fully and everywhere, upon this subject, would not woman obey it? Are not women under the special leading and direction of their clergymen? You may tell me, that it is woman who forms the mind of the child; but I charge it back again, that it is the minister who forms the mind of the woman. It is he who makes the mother what she is; therefore her teaching of the child is only conveying the instructions of the pulpit at second hand. If public sentiment is wrong on this (and I have the testimony of those who have spoken this morning, that it is), the pulpit is responsible for it, and has the power of changing it. The clergy claim the credit of establishing public schools. Granted. Listen to the pulpit in any matter of humanity, and they will claim the originating of it, because they are the teachers of the people. Now, if we give credit to the pulpit for establishing public schools, then I charge them with having a bad influence over those schools; and if the charge can be rolled off, I want it to be rolled off; but until it can be done, I hope it will remain there."
Quote Details
Added by wikiquote-import-bot
Unverified quote
0 likes
AbolitionistsSocial activistsWomen activists from the United StatesWomen's rights activistsActivists from Massachusetts
Original Language: English
Available Languages (1)
Sources
"It is the Pulpit Who Casts Out 'Impure' Women" (1853)
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Abby_Kelley_Foster
Revision History
No revisions have been submitted for this quote.
Categories
Abby Kelley Foster
Abby Kelley Foster (January 15, 1811 – January 14, 1887) was an American abolitionist and radical social reformer active from the 1830s to 1870s. She became a fundraiser, lecturer and committee organizer for the influential American Anti-Slavery Society, where she worked closely with William Lloyd Garrison and other radicals. She married fellow abolitionist and lecturer Stephen Symonds Foster, and they both worked for equal rights for women and for Africans enslaved in the Americas.
21 quotes on TrueQuotesView all quotes by Abby Kelley Foster →
Related Quotes
"The widening of women’s sphere is to improve her lot. Let us do it, and if the world scoff, let it scoff — if it snee…"
"Why were we so indifferent? Why, as a lady once said to me, five-eighths of us were so busy glorifying in our own fre…"
"It is the system that must be entirely annihilated. Some who are int its toil are dear to me. They will be saved as i…"
"There is less need of discussion than we sometimes imagine, and more of action."
"I rejoice to be fully identified with the despised people of color. If they are despised, wo ought we their advocates…"
"The Female Anti-Slavery Society was the first national woman's rights organization in the United States. It was compo…"
"When the early Woman Suffragists took their stand for a redress of the wrongs of women, they used no vague or ambiguo…"
"The anti-slavery cause had come to break stronger fetters than those that held the slave. The idea of equal rights wa…"
"I think, with never-ending gratitude, that the young women of today do not and can never know at what price their rig…"
"She had, ten years ago, two and a half millions in the condition shadowed out by that print. She! who had declared as…"