Emma Hardinge Britten on No Limits

Born in London, Britain in 1823, Emma Hardinge Britten is best known for her work in Spiritualism with over a dozen books on the subject. She is credited with establishing the seven principles of Spiritualism still in use today. However, starting at age twelve, she also had a varied career as a professional singer, pianist, and actress.

In 1859, she came to the United States and was a prime mover in the growth of Spiritualism at the time. In the 1860s, like Anna Dickinson, she became a popular orator during the American Civil War. Despite being British, in 1864, she was paid by the Republican party to campaign for Lincoln’s 1864 second term. Hardinge’s most acclaimed speech was given upon the assassination of President Lincoln.

She was also a fighter for social justice taking up the cause of maltreatment of the Chinese immigrants, the welfare of prostitutes (which grew out of her own negative experiences in the theater) and for women’s rights.

The following excerpt is taken from The Place and Mission of Women, a speech given in 1859 in Boston.

We can see no limit to the power of women to enter into the chambers of knowledge; we can see no bound which should hedge in the genius of women; but we can see, in the fine and ever-revolving wheels of her womanly nature, so many levers, so many propelling powers, that we ask thee, O man, for thy own best interests, to open the door of thy colleges, and schools, and permit thy helpmeet to walk in, and do thee a better service than thou canst render for thyself. O think of what thou wilt do for that army, which at best at present is an army of martyrs, the dolls of the drawing room, the mere glittering children of fashion, who troll their silks and satins along the highway, desolate for want of an occupation with all the yearning aspirations of their souls going forth in the wrong direction! You can not crush them out of life; there they are, and there they will find an outlet. And how do they find it? They fall upon what you leave for them—the shop windows, the toys and frivolities of life…Let it be disgraceful for the women, for the daughters, and for the sisters of life to have no occupations, as it would be disgraceful for men to fritter away the noble energies of manhood and spend their days in idleness and uselessness, the drones of life. pp. 8-10