Surely woman should bring the best she has, _whatever_ that is, to
the work of God's world, without attending to either of these cries.
For what are they, both of them, the one _just_ as much as the
other, but listening to the "what people will say," to opinion, to
the "voices from without?" And as a wise man has said, no one has
ever done anything great or useful by listening to the voices from
without.
You do not want the effect of your good things to be, "How
wonderful for a _woman!_" nor would you be deterred from good
things, by hearing it said, "Yes, but she ought not to have done
this, because it is not suitable for a woman." But you want to do
the thing that is good, whether it is "suitable for a woman" or
not.
It does not make a thing good, that it is remarkable that a woman
should have been able to do it. Neither does it make a thing bad,
which would have been good had a man done it, that it has been done
by a woman.
Oh, leave these jargons, and go your way straight to God's work, in
simplicity and singleness of heart.
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