her own efforts. Sir Charles Lucas had tutors for
his daughters, but half the year the family spent
in London, enjoying all the diversions the capital
could afford, and study was not at all strictly en-
forced on the girls. The Duchess wrote numerous
poems and prose works of a philosophical character,
and was, she tells us herself, a very rapid composer,
her ideas outrunning her hand. Judged by the
standard of to-day, her works seem like the voluble
outpourings of a curious fancy. Her ideas are
interesting rather as giving us a glimpse of the
thought of her day, than valuable for intrinsic
merit or freshness ; but in her lifetime she was
applauded by scholars with lavish adulation, partly,
no doubt, on account of her rank. The heads of
the University of Cambridge were full of wonder
that a woman should be able to compose such
works, and many scholars from other parts wrote
in terms of respectful admiration and astonishment.
The fulsome flatteries poured into the ears of the
duchess were unworthy of their authors, but there
is no doubt that her productions appeared sufficiently
remarkable to her contemporaries. More than one
scholar to whom the duchess sent her books,
remarks on the proof her Grace has given that
women are as capable of intellectual acquirements
as men. One writes that she has confirmed the



EDUCA TION IN THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY. 1 5 3

statement of an old author, that women excel men ;
and another, that she has clearly decided the
question of mental equality between the sexes.
In watching the evolution of women in regard
to learning, the general estimation in which learning
was held in those days has also to be noted.
