The grown-up son has so long been considered a citizen with well-defined duties and a need of “making his way in the world,” that the family claim is urged much less strenuously in his case, and as a matter of authority, it ceases gradually to be made at all.  In the case of the grown-up daughter, however, who is under no necessity of earning a living, and who has no strong artistic bent, taking her to Paris to study painting or to Germany to study music, the years immediately following her graduation from college are too often filled with a restlessness and unhappiness which might be avoided by a little clear thinking, and by an adaptation of our code of family ethics to modern conditions.

It is always difficult for the family to regard the daughter otherwise than as a family possession.  From her babyhood she has been the charm and grace of the household, and it is hard to think of her as an integral part of the social order, hard to believe that she has duties outside of the family, to the state and to society in the larger sense.  This assumption that the daughter is solely an inspiration and refinement to the family itself and its own immediate circle, that her delicacy and polish are but outward symbols of her father’s protection and prosperity, worked very smoothly for the most part so long as her education was in line with it.  When there was absolutely no recognition of the entity of woman’s life beyond the family, when the outside claims upon her were still wholly unrecognized, the situation was simple, and the finishing school harmoniously and elegantly answered all requirements.  She was fitted to grace the fireside and to add lustre to that social circle which her parents selected for her.  But this family assumption has been notably broken into, and educational ideas no longer fit it.  Modern education recognizes woman quite apart from family or society claims, and gives her the training which for many years has been deemed successful for highly developing a man’s individuality and freeing his powers for independent action.  Perplexities often occur when the daughter returns from college and finds that this recognition has been but partially accomplished.  When she attempts to act upon the assumption of its accomplishment, she finds herself jarring upon ideals which are so entwined with filial piety, so rooted in the tenderest affections of which the human heart is capable, that both daughter and parents are shocked and startled when they discover what is happening, and they scarcely venture to analyze the situation.  The ideal for the education of woman has changed under the pressure of a new claim.  The family has responded to the extent of granting the education, but they are jealous of the new claim and assert the family claim as over against it.