E102B Restoration & Revolution || SQ || Mary Astell Study Questions
Part I.
1. The first significant thinking about the fundamental inequality of men and women centered on education. Astell's proposal--that women should commit themselves to the life of the mind--is a remedy for centuries of wrong practice. Why do you think the issue of education was the first feminist issue? How does Astell's view of the importance of education coincide with her saying, "We value [men] too much and our selves too little, if we place any part of our worth in their Opinion" (55)? What do you make of the fact that Astell appears to say that a careful eduction for women produces dutifulness? Consider "'Tis the kindness of Education that binds our duty fastest on us" (60)
And consider this: "A desire to advance and perfect its Being, is planted by GOD in all Rational creatures" (62).
2. In some respects, Astell's A Serious Proposal to the Ladies is a proposal that competes with the proposal by a man to a woman for marriage. How far does this statement help us analyze Astell's work?
3. Astell is sometimes more quotable than readable. What might be the rhetorical benefit of a style that tends toward pithy statement rather than logical development? If you have read Mary Wollstonecraft's Vindication of the Rights of Woman, you may notice similarities between these two works. Both Astell and Wollstonecraft can be said to be 'rhetorically excessive.' Why might this excess be expected? And why might it be effective?
It's part of my job to make Astell readable. What do you think I need to do?
4. Notice words indicating economic value: "Profitable"' "real worth"; "Gain"; "Value"; "cheap"; "Money"; "purchase" (51). Can you tell what Astell's strategy is here? What kind of contrast is she setting up? What, in her view, is of greatest value? What kind of values, activities, and achievements would she regard as trivial, trifling, and cheap? Mark particular sections in which Astell outlines or implies a contrast of values?
5. What is Astell's ambition for women? (Highlight her uses of "aspire.") Do you think her language of ambition can be useful to readers in our day who do not share her conservative political and religious views? What, in her view, is in women's "real interest"? What does she mean when she says, "I would have you live up to the dignity of your Nature" (57)? What is the status of a word like "decoration" in Astell's thinking?
6. Notice words like "reflection"; "glass"; "shadows"; "substance"; "Reality" and "Appearance" (52, 64, & passim). Astell is a neo-Platonist. How do these terms make sense in a neo-Platonist frame of reference? How can you map onto these terms her question to women: "How can you be content to be in the World like Tulips in a Garden, to make a fine shew and be good for nothing?" (54). What sort of garden does Astell think women should be cultivating. Would it make sense to think of cultivating the garden of the soul?
7. Think carefully about the idea of "cultivation." If minds are like gardens, what does cultivation do? Mark her uses of the word "cultivate" and see if you can make a generalization about Astell and cultivation.
8. What would Astell think of Barbie dolls? America's next top model? In fact, what would Astell think of modeling as a career?
9. "Custom" is a key term for Astell. What does it mean in her thinking? How does her treatment of "custom" coincide with her neo-Platonism? Notice, for example, that she says women should "dare to break the enchanted Circle that custom has plac'd us in" (55). And she says, "Thus Ignorance and a narrow Education, lay the Foundation of Vice, and Imitation and Custom rear it up. Custom, that merciless torrent that carries all before" (67). And "'Tis Custom therefore, that Tyrant Custom, which is the grand motive to all those irrational choices which we daily see made in the world, so very contrary to our present interest and pleasure , as well as to our Future" (67-8). How does the concept of "custom" fit into Astell's neo-Platonic thinking? Why is "custom" a tyrant? And what does Astell mean by saying that religion itself has very little value if taken up merely as the custom of country in which one lives?
10. Why is Custom aligned with Ignorance? Consider: "Therefore, one great end of this institution, shall be to expel that cloud of Ignorance, which Custom has involv'd us in, to furnish our minds with a stock of solid and useful Knowledge, that the Souls of Women may no longer be the only unadorn'd and neglected things" (67).
11. Imagine a conversation among Rochester, Bunyan, & Astell. Would Bunyan ever be an ally to Astell? What about Rochester? Would Bunyan and Rochester ever find themselves allied against Astell?
Could you fit the following sentences into Bunyan's understanding of the world: "In fine, the place to which you are invited is a Type and Antepast of Heav'n, where our Employment will be as there, to magnifiy GOD, to love one another, and to communicate that useful knowledge, which by the due improvement of your time in Study and Contemplation you will obtain; and which when obtain'd, will afford you a much sweeer and more durable delight, than all those pitiful diversions, those revellings and amusements, which now thro your ignorance of better, appear the only grateful and relishing Entertainments" (77).
Now imagine Astell's response to the commonplaces about women that occur in The Country Wife. What is her relation to satiric treatments of women? Notice that she says that a woman is disadvantaged by having "no better Notion of [love and honor] than what she derives from Plays and Romances."
12. What do you make of Astell's question to the Ladies (her audience): Why are you "goveling here below, like Domitian catching flies when you should be busied in obtaining Empires?" (58). Does it make sense to think of "satiric elements" of Astell's work? If so, how do they function?
13. What is the remedy for the ills that Astell sees in her culture?
14. How does Astell's proposal sound to you?
"You are therefore Ladies invited into a place, where you shall suffer no other confinement, but to be kept out of the road of Sin" (74).
"All that is requir'd of you, is only to be as Happy as possibly you can, and to make sure of a Felicity that will fill all the capacities of your Souls!" (74).
"Happy retreat! which will be the introducing you into such a Paradise as your Mother Eve forfeited, where you shall feast on Pleasures, that do not like those of the World, disappoint your expectations, pall your Appetites, and by the disgust they give you, put you on the fruitless search after new Delights. . . . Here are no Serpents to deceive you" (74).
15. Would you join Astell in her educational proposal?
16. How do you analyze the following statements by Astell (are they consistant with her Christian neo-Platonism)?
"Let her but obtain right Ideas, and be tryly acquainted with the natue of those Objects that present themselves to her mind, and then no matter whether or no she be able to tell what fanciful people have said about them: And throughly to understand Christianity as profess'd by the Church of England, will be sufficient to confirm her in the truth tho' she have not a Catalogue of those particular errors which oppose it" (78-9).
17. Why might Astell approve of a program of studying Descartes rather than one of reading romances:
"And since the French Tongue is understood by most Ladies, methinks they may much better improve it by the study of Philosophy (as I hear the French Ladies do) Des Cartes, Malebranch and others, than by reading idle Novels and Romances" (82-3).
18. Rather than go into detail about her program at this point, Astell says that women who agree to join her "will be more than ordinarily careful to redeem their time, spending no more of it on the Body than the necessities of Nature require" (84). How is this consistent with what Astell maintains generally?
Virtue, Astell says, will "enlarge your Souls, raise them above the common level, and encourage that allowable Pride of Scorning to do a base unworthy action. Make you truly amiable in the eyes of GOD and Man, preserve ever the Beauty of your Bodies so long as 'tis possible for such a brittle thing to last; and when it must of necessity decay, impress such a loveliness on your Minds, as will shine thro' and brighten your very countenances; enriching you with such a stock of Charms, that Time which devours every other thing, shall never be able to decay. In a word, 'tis Virtue only which can make you truly happy in the world as well as in the next."
Just as a thought experiment, ask yourself how this view of time would tranlate to your situation? Could you join Astell in the spirit if not the letter of what she recommend? Why is redeeming time so important? Notice that Astell later says that time is "a Treasure whose value we are oo often quite ignorant of till it be lost past redemption."
19. The society Astell proposes "will be but one Body, whose Soul is love, animating and informing it, and perpetually breathing forth it self in flames of holy desire after GOD, and acts of Benevolence to each other" (87). What sort of political unity would match Astell's sense of spiritual and religious unity?
20. Why does Astell think separate living for women is a good idea? Could you make an argument for same-sex high schools or colleges?
21. Astell imagines her audience as women of a certain rank. How do you gain glimpses of the importance of social order in Astell's thinking? Are her principles equally applicable to other ranks of society? What sort of nobility does Astell have in mind when she says, "There is a sort of Bravery and Greatness of Soul, which does more truly ennoble us than the highest Title, and it consists in living up to the dignity of our Natures, scorning to do a degenerate and unbecoming thing"? (111).
22. Does Astell's reasoning in what follows seem attractive? "But the men if they rightly understand their own interest, have no reason to oppose the ingenious Education of the Women, since 'twould go a great way towards reclaiming the men; great is the influence we have over them in their Childhood, in which time, if a Mother be discreet and knowing as well as devout, she has many opportunities of giving such Form and Season to the tender Mind of the Child, as will shew its good effects thro' all the stages of his Life" (106).
23. Astell tries to make her proposal sound attractive to the gentry by saying, "'Nor can I think of any expedient so useful as this to Persons of Quality who are over-stock'd with Children, for thus they may honourably dispoe of them without impairing their estates. Five or six hundred pounds may be easily spar'd with a Daughter, when so many thousand would go deep; and yet as the world goes be a very inconsiderable Fortune for Ladies of their Birth; neither maintain them in that Port which Custom makes almost necessary, nor procure them an equal Match, those of their own Rank . . . chusing rather to fill their Coffers than to preserve the purity of their Blood, and therefore think a weighty Bag the best Gentility, preferring a wealthy Upstart before the best Descended and best Qualified Lady" (107). What social instabilities do you see in Astell's statement?
Part II.
1. Astell asks what it is that hinders women from taking up her plan. "And pray what is't that hinders you? The signularity of the Matter? Are you afraid of being out of the ordinary way, and therefore admir'd and gaz'd at?" (120). What is Astell working against? Could you compare her at this point to Bunyan? What about her desire to allow women to "have a true Notion of the Nothingness of Material things and of the reality and substantialness of immaterial, and consequently contemn this present World as it deserves, fixing all their Hopes upon and exerting all their Endeavours to obtain the glories of the next" (126)?
2. What does Astell mean by "custom"? Notice the ways she characterizes custom: "a Yoke of Impertinent Customs"; "As Prejudice fetters the Understanding so does Custom manacle the Will"(139); "Custom cannot Authorise a Practice if Reason Condemns it" (139).
3. What does "Creature" mean as Astell uses it? "What End," she asks, "can Creatures have but their Creators Glory?" (142).
4. Astell says some knowledge is necessary before there can be anything called "Human Acts: for till we are capable of Chusing our own Actions and directing them by some Principle, tho we Move and Speak and so many such like things, we live not the Life of a Rational Creature but only of an Animal." Does this statement offer itself as evidence for any claim you could make about Astell?
5. Astell discusses the problem of people's aiming at Happiness without a sufficient understanding of what it is. She also says in Pt. II, Ch. 1 that "our power of Willing exerts it self much sooner than that Rational Faculty which is to Govern it" (129-30) . What's the problem here? (Could you imagine using this idea to explain the behavior of a 2-year old?) In Ch. 3 she says that our problem is that we have limited (that is, finite) minds (146). Why is that such a problem? Later in Ch. 3, she says, "Some sort of Ignorance therefore, or Non perception we cannot help; a Finite Mind, suppose it as large as you please, can never extend it self to Infinite Truths" (158-9). What do you think of her recommendation that if we discover we're not all that good at reasoning we should simply engage in an "Active Life and Employments that depend on the Body" (160)?6. Pay careful attention to what Astell says about obedience at the end of Ch. 1 of Part II. Why is obedience crucial in the training of the human mind?
7. Astell says "we doze on in a Circle with out Neighbours" (131). Could this be material for satire?
8. Sounding quite a lot like Descartes, Astell says we must "disengage our selves from all our former Prejudices, from our Opinion of Names, Authorities, Customs and the like, not give credit to anything any longer because we have once believ'd it, but because it carries clear and uncontested Evidence along with it" (133). Do you see other evidence of her view that we should not take things on authority and that we should only believe something when it stands the test of reason? See, for example, "consider that our Forefathers were Men of like Passions with us, and are therefore not to be Credited on the score of Authority but of Reason" (136). What sort of attitude toward the past does Astell imply? What is the one exception? T what authority must we acquiesce (see p. 138)?
9. Consider the following material and make a claim about Astell's view of male/female relationships:
"We are not made for our selves, nor was it ever design'd we shou'd be ador'd and idoliz'd by one another" (142).
10. What would Rochester think of the following statement by Astell? Compare what Astell says here to the description of the truly good man in Rochester's prasie section of A Satyr against Reason and Mankind.
Did our Knowledge serve no other purpose than the exalting us in our own Opinion, or in that of our Fellow Creatures, the furnishing us with Materials for a quaint Discourse, an agreeable Conversation, 'twere scarce worth while to be at the trouble of attaining it. But when it enlarges the Capacity of our Minds, gives us nobler ideas of the Majesty, the Grandeur and Glourious Attributes of our adorable Creator, Regulates our Wills and makes us more capable of Imitating and Enjoying him, 'tis then a truly sublime thing, a worthy Object of our Industry:And she who does not make this the End of her Study, spends her Time and Pains to no purpose or to an ill one (141).
What about Rochester as a reader of what follows below? Or Bunyan. Is any part of Astell portable?
Contemplation requires a Governable body, a sedate and steady Mind, and the Body and the Mind do so reciprocally influence each other, that we can scarce keep the one in tune if the other be out of it. We can neither Observe the Errors of our Intellect, nor the Irregularity of our Morals whilst we are darkned by Fumes, agitated with unruly Passions, or carried away with eager Desires after Sensible things and vanities. We must therefore withdraw our Minds from the World, from adhering to the Senses, from the Love of Material Beings, of Pomps and Gaieties; for 'tis these that usually Steal away the Heart, that seduce the Mind to such unaccountable Wandrings, and so fill up its Capacity that they leave no room for Truth, so distract its Attention that it cannot enquire after her (161).
11. Would Bunyan agree with Astell here:
For if the Grand Business that Women as well as Men have to do in this World be to prepare for the next, ought not all their Care and Industry to Centre here?
12. Which of our writers might respond to what follows?
And as when a rash young Traveller is about to run into dangerous places beset with Theives and full of Precipices, if you have any hearty concern for his safety, you'l not think it enough barely to shew him his way, or even to tell him of the Danger, especially if the entrance seems fair and inviting and treacherous Companions are upon the watch to decoy him into it: But you'l expose it in all its frightful Circumstances, endeavour to quicken his vigilance and excite his Passions, and all little enough for his Security. So it cannot be thought sufficient that Women shou'd but just know whats Commanded and what Forbid, without being inform'd of the Reason why since this is not like to secure them in their Duty. For we find a Natural Liberty within us which checks at an Injunction that has nothing but Authority to back it; And tho Religion is indeed supported by the Strongest Reasons, and inforc'd by the most powerful Motives, yet if we are not acquainted with 'em, tis all one to us as if it were not (200-01).
13. Could any of our writers have said what follows:
Nor will Knowledge lie dead upon their hands who have no Children to Instruct; the whole World is a single Lady's Family, her opportunities of doing good are not lessen'd but encreas'd by her being unconfin'd. Particular Obligations do not contract her Mind (203).