WOMEN OF INDIA-6.

(Delivered at the Shakespeare Club House, in Pasadena, California, on January 18, 1900)

 For Recap -Read Part-1, 2, 3,4 and 5.

THE LECTURE :- Continued from part-6.


Now, the ideal woman in India is the mother, the mother first, and the mother last.

The word woman calls up to the mind of the Hindu, motherhood; and God is called Mother.

As children, every day, when we are boys, we have to go early in the morning with a little cup of water and place it before the mother, and mother dips her toe into it and we drink it.



In the West, the woman is wife.

The idea of womanhood is concentrated there — as the wife.

To the ordinary man in India, the whole force of womanhood is concentrated in motherhood.

In the Western home, the wife rules.

In an Indian home, the mother rules.

If a mother comes into a Western home, she has to be subordinate to the wife; to the wife belongs the home.

A mother always lives in our homes: the wife must be subordinate to her.

See all the difference of ideas.

Swami Vivekananda
To be continued