Page:Heroines of freethought (IA cu31924031228699).pdf/278

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270
ERNESTINE L. ROSE

me,' from the women; and ‘They have already too many rights,” from the men. And so our first petition was graced by only five signatures; but perseverance, year after year, with increased petitions and names, obtained in 1849 the boon that gave married women the right to hold what belonged to them, in their own name.”

So from the first she never allowed herself to be discouraged in any undertaking by which she hoped to effect a reform. She fearlessly attached her full signature to the articles from her pen, which frequently graced the columns of the Boston Investigator, an avowedly infidel and atheistic publication; and in her lectures she as fearlessly attacked the clergy, and the pro-slavery men, as if her views were among the most popular and general of those held by the masses.

“Once,” M. D. Conway tells this of her, "she went down South, and after being there a little time, her soul was stirred at what she saw going on in the fair city of