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In John Locke's Some Thoughts Concerning Education (1986), he insisted that the most important goal of education was virtue. He defined virtue as the knowledge of a man`s duty. Locke wrote about the education of young gentlemen, he claims, however, that his recommendations apply to the education of both boys and girls (Locke, 1986). Although the moralists who wrote about female education agreed that it was important to teach women to know their duty and therefore become virtuous, their definition of a women's duty was rather vague.
Most writers on female education agreed that a woman's most important duty should be to educate her children, which is also the only reason a woman should be educated at all (Horwitz, 1991). Jane West did not disagree, but she noted that a woman had a wider range of obligations. She stated in her Letters to a Young Lady (1806) that women's duty also included generosity and religion. For example, Emma Woodhouse in Jane Austen?s novel Emma is aware of her duty to her family, shown in her efforts to provide company for her father and as a loving sister and aunt.
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She does, however, need to be reminded about her duty to other people. Mr. Knightley, for example, points out to her that she is not doing her duty with regard to Harriet Smith, who may never receive such an eligible offer again when Emma dissuades Harriet from marrying Robert Martin. Mr. Knightley also scolds Emma when she neglects her duty towards Jane Fairfax and Miss Bates.
Emma fails in her duty towards the younger woman by being so absorbed in romantic fictions of her own creation, she does not perceive that Jane is secretly engaged to Frank Churchill. She also fails most grievously in her duty to Miss Bates on Box Hill where she has inadvertently made Jane miserable too, when she makes an unkind joke at her expense. It is Mr Knightley who again reminds Emma of her duty. Emma learns from these situations and changes throughout the novel. She tries to make amends to Miss Bates and Jane Fairfax soon after she begins to perceive her duty towards them, she also realizes she is in love with Mr. Knightley. Even in the midst of her joy at his proposal of marriage, however, she remembers her duty to Harriet and arranges an invitation to London for her (Emma, 1816). In this way, Harriet can reunite with Robert Martin and the damage caused by Emma is repaired. In the end of the novel, Emma has finally been impelled to do her duty, not by Mr. Knightley solely, but because she has come to know her own mind and educated herself not in the classic way through schools and tutor's, but by her mistakes she made in the past.
John Locke's Some Thoughts Concerning Education. (2019, Dec 06). Retrieved from https://studymoose.com/john-lockes-some-thoughts-concerning-education-essay
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