It will perhaps be sufficient if I confine myself, in the details of my argument, to functions of a public nature: since, if I am successful as to those, it probably will be readily granted that women should be admissible to all other occupations to which it is at all material whether they are admitted or not. And here let me begin by marking out one function, broadly distinguished from all others, their right to which is entirely29 independent of any question which can be raised concerning their faculties. I mean the suffrage30, both parliamentary and municipal. The [Pg 96] right to share in the choice of those who are to exercise a public trust, is altogether a distinct thing from that of competing for the trust itself. If no one could vote for a member of parliament who was not fit to be a candidate, the government would be a narrow oligarchy31 indeed. To have a voice in choosing those by whom one is to be governed, is a means of self-protection due to every one, though he were to remain for ever excluded from the function of governing: and that women are considered fit to have such a choice, may be presumed from the fact, that the law already gives it to women in the most important of all cases to themselves: for the choice of the man who is to govern a woman to the end of life, is always supposed to be voluntarily made by herself. In the case of election to public trusts, it is the business of constitutional law to surround the right of suffrage with all needful securities and limitations; but whatever securities are sufficient in the case of the male sex, no others need be required in the case of women. Under whatever conditions, and within whatever limits, men are admitted to the suffrage, there is not a shadow of justification32 for not admitting women under the same. The majority of the women of any class are not likely to differ in political opinion from the majority of the men of the same class, unless [Pg 97] the question be one in which the interests of women, as such, are in some way involved; and if they are so, women require the suffrage, as their guarantee of just and equal consideration. This ought to be obvious even to those who coincide in no other of the doctrines34 for which I contend. Even if every woman were a wife, and if every wife ought to be a slave, all the more would these slaves stand in need of legal protection: and we know what legal protection the slaves have, where the laws are made by their masters.
With regard to the fitness of women, not only to participate in elections, but themselves to hold offices or practise professions involving important public responsibilities; I have already observed that this consideration is not essential to the practical question in dispute: since any woman, who succeeds in an open profession, proves by that very fact that she is qualified for it. And in the case of public offices, if the political system of the country is such as to exclude unfit men, it will equally exclude unfit women: while if it is not, there is no additional evil in the fact that the unfit persons whom it admits may be either women or men. As long therefore as it is acknowledged that even a few women may be fit for these duties, the laws which shut the door on those exceptions cannot be justified35 by any opinion which can be held respecting the [Pg 98] capacities of women in general. But, though this last consideration is not essential, it is far from being irrelevant36. An unprejudiced view of it gives additional strength to the arguments against the disabilities of women, and reinforces them by high considerations of practical utility.
Let us at first make entire abstraction of all psychological considerations tending to show, that any of the mental differences supposed to exist between women and men are but the natural effect of the differences in their education and circumstances, and indicate no radical37 difference, far less radical inferiority, of nature. Let us consider women only as they already are, or as they are known to have been; and the capacities which they have already practically shown. What they have done, that at least, if nothing else, it is proved that they can do. When we consider how sedulously38 they are all trained away from, instead of being trained towards, any of the occupations or objects reserved for men, it is evident that I am taking a very humble39 ground for them, when I rest their case on what they have actually achieved. For, in this case, negative evidence is worth little, while any positive evidence is conclusive40. It cannot be inferred to be impossible that a woman should be a Homer, or an Aristotle, or a Michael Angelo, or a Beethoven, because no woman has yet actually produced [Pg 99] works comparable to theirs in any of those lines of excellence41. This negative fact at most leaves the question uncertain, and open to psychological discussion. But it is quite certain that a woman can be a Queen Elizabeth, or a Deborah, or a Joan of Arc, since this is not inference, but fact. Now it is a curious consideration, that the only things which the existing law excludes women from doing, are the things which they have proved that they are able to do. There is no law to prevent a woman from having written all the plays of Shakspeare, or composed all the operas of Mozart. But Queen Elizabeth or Queen Victoria, had they not inherited the throne, could not have been intrusted with the smallest of the political duties, of which the former showed herself equal to the greatest.
If anything conclusive could be inferred from experience, without psychological analysis, it would be that the things which women are not allowed to do are the very ones for which they are peculiarly qualified; since their vocation for government has made its way, and become conspicuous43, through the very few opportunities which have been given; while in the lines of distinction which apparently44 were freely open to them, they have by no means so eminently45 distinguished themselves. We know how small a number of reigning47 queens history presents, in [Pg 100] comparison with that of kings. Of this smaller number a far larger proportion have shown talents for rule; though many of them have occupied the throne in difficult periods. It is remarkable48, too, that they have, in a great number of instances, been distinguished by merits the most opposite to the imaginary and conventional character of women: they have been as much remarked for the firmness and vigour49 of their rule, as for its intelligence. When, to queens and empresses, we add regents, and viceroys of provinces, the list of women who have been eminent rulers of mankind swells50 to a great length.[1] This fact is so undeniable, that some one, long ago, tried to retort the argument, and turned the admitted truth into an additional insult, by saying that queens are better than [Pg 101] kings, because under kings women govern, but under queens, men.
It may seem a waste of reasoning to argue against a bad joke; but such things do affect people's minds; and I have heard men quote this saying, with an air as if they thought that there was something in it. At any rate, it will serve as well as anything else for a starting point in discussion. I say, then, that it is not true that under kings, women govern. Such cases are entirely exceptional: and weak kings have quite as often governed ill through the influence of male favourites, as of female. When a king is governed by a woman merely through his amatory propensities51, good government is not probable, though even then there are exceptions. But French history counts two kings who have voluntarily given the direction of affairs during many years, the one to his mother, the other to his sister: one of them, Charles VIII., was a mere boy, but in doing so he followed the intentions of his father Louis XI., the ablest monarch52 of his age. The other, Saint Louis, was the best, and one of the most vigorous rulers, since the time of Charlemagne. Both these princesses ruled in a manner hardly equalled by any prince among their contemporaries. The emperor Charles the Fifth, the most politic1 prince of his time, who had as great a number of able men in [Pg 102] his service as a ruler ever had, and was one of the least likely of all sovereigns to sacrifice his interest to personal feelings, made two princesses of his family successively Governors of the Netherlands, and kept one or other of them in that post during his whole life, (they were afterwards succeeded by a third). Both ruled very successfully, and one of them, Margaret of Austria, was one of the ablest politicians of the age. So much for one side of the question. Now as to the other. When it is said that under queens men govern, is the same meaning to be understood as when kings are said to be governed by women? Is it meant that queens choose as their instruments of government, the associates of their personal pleasures? The case is rare even with those who are as unscrupulous on the latter point as Catherine II.: and it is not in these cases that the good government, alleged53 to arise from male influence, is to be found. If it be true, then, that the administration is in the hands of better men under a queen than under an average king, it must be that queens have a superior capacity for choosing them; and women must be better qualified than men both for the position of sovereign, and for that of chief minister; for the principal business of a prime minister is not to govern in person, but to find the fittest persons to conduct every department of public affairs. [Pg 103] The more rapid insight into character, which is one of the admitted points of superiority in women over men, must certainly make them, with anything like parity54 of qualifications in other respects, more apt than men in that choice of instruments, which is nearly the most important business of every one who has to do with governing mankind. Even the unprincipled Catherine de' Medici could feel the value of a Chancellor55 de l'H?pital. But it is also true that most great queens have been great by their own talents for government, and have been well served precisely56 for that reason. They retained the supreme57 direction of affairs in their own hands: and if they listened to good advisers58, they gave by that fact the strongest proof that their judgment59 fitted them for dealing60 with the great questions of government.
Is it reasonable to think that those who are fit for the greater functions of politics, are incapable of qualifying themselves for the less? Is there any reason in the nature of things, that the wives and sisters of princes should, whenever called on, be found as competent as the princes themselves to their business, but that the wives and sisters of statesmen, and administrators61, and directors of companies, and managers of public institutions, should be unable to do what is done by their brothers and husbands? The real [Pg 104] reason is plain enough; it is that princesses, being more raised above the generality of men by their rank than placed below them by their sex, have never been taught that it was improper62 for them to concern themselves with politics; but have been allowed to feel the liberal interest natural to any cultivated human being, in the great transactions which took place around them, and in which they might be called on to take a part. The ladies of reigning families are the only women who are allowed the same range of interests and freedom of development as men; and it is precisely in their case that there is not found to be any inferiority. Exactly where and in proportion as women's capacities for government have been tried, in that proportion have they been found adequate.
This fact is in accordance with the best general conclusions which the world's imperfect experience seems as yet to suggest, concerning the peculiar42 tendencies and aptitudes63 characteristic of women, as women have hitherto been. I do not say, as they will continue to be; for, as I have already said more than once, I consider it presumption65 in any one to pretend to decide what women are or are not, can or cannot be, by natural constitution. They have always hitherto been kept, as far as regards spontaneous development, in so unnatural66 a state, that their nature [Pg 105] cannot but have been greatly distorted and disguised; and no one can safely pronounce that if women's nature were left to choose its direction as freely as men's, and if no artificial bent67 were attempted to be given to it except that required by the conditions of human society, and given to both sexes alike, there would be any material difference, or perhaps any difference at all, in the character and capacities which would unfold themselves. I shall presently show, that even the least contestable of the differences which now exist, are such as may very well have been produced merely by circumstances, without any difference of natural capacity. But, looking at women as they are known in experience, it may be said of them, with more truth than belongs to most other generalizations68 on the subject, that the general bent of their talents is towards the practical. This statement is conformable to all the public history of women, in the present and the past. It is no less borne out by common and daily experience. Let us consider the special nature of the mental capacities most characteristic of a woman of talent. They are all of a kind which fits them for practice, and makes them tend towards it. What is meant by a woman's capacity of intuitive perception? It means, a rapid and correct insight into present fact. It has nothing to do with general principles. [Pg 106] Nobody ever perceived a scientific law of nature by intuition, nor arrived at a general rule of duty or prudence69 by it. These are results of slow and careful collection and comparison of experience; and neither the men nor the women of intuition usually shine in this department, unless, indeed, the experience necessary is such as they can acquire by themselves. For what is called their intuitive sagacity makes them peculiarly apt in gathering70 such general truths as can be collected from their individual means of observation. When, consequently, they chance to be as well provided as men are with the results of other people's experience, by reading and education, (I use the word chance advisedly, for, in respect to the knowledge that tends to fit them for the greater concerns of life, the only educated women are the self-educated) they are better furnished than men in general with the essential requisites71 of skilful73 and successful practice. Men who have been much taught, are apt to be deficient74 in the sense of present fact; they do not see, in the facts which they are called upon to deal with, what is really there, but what they have been taught to expect. This is seldom the case with women of any ability. Their capacity of “intuition” preserves them from it. With equality of experience and of general faculties, a woman [Pg 107] usually sees much more than a man of what is immediately before her. Now this sensibility to the present, is the main quality on which the capacity for practice, as distinguished from theory, depends. To discover general principles, belongs to the speculative76 faculty77: to discern and discriminate78 the particular cases in which they are and are not applicable, constitutes practical talent: and for this, women as they now are have a peculiar aptitude64. I admit that there can be no good practice without principles, and that the predominant place which quickness of observation holds among a woman's faculties, makes her particularly apt to build over-hasty generalizations upon her own observation; though at the same time no less ready in rectifying79 those generalizations, as her observation takes a wider range. But the corrective to this defect, is access to the experience of the human race; general knowledge—exactly the thing which education can best supply. A woman's mistakes are specifically those of a clever self-educated man, who often sees what men trained in routine do not see, but falls into errors for want of knowing things which have long been known. Of course he has acquired much of the pre-existing knowledge, or he could not have got on at all; but what he knows of it he has picked up in fragments and at random80, as women do. [Pg 108]
But this gravitation of women's minds to the present, to the real, to actual fact, while in its exclusiveness it is a source of errors, is also a most useful counteractive81 of the contrary error. The principal and most characteristic aberration82 of speculative minds as such, consists precisely in the deficiency of this lively perception and ever-present sense of objective fact. For want of this, they often not only overlook the contradiction which outward facts oppose to their theories, but lose sight of the legitimate83 purpose of speculation84 altogether, and let their speculative faculties go astray into regions not peopled with real beings, animate85 or inanimate, even idealized, but with personified shadows created by the illusions of metaphysics or by the mere entanglement86 of words, and think these shadows the proper objects of the highest, the most transcendant, philosophy. Hardly anything can be of greater value to a man of theory and speculation who employs himself not in collecting materials of knowledge by observation, but in working them up by processes of thought into comprehensive truths of science and laws of conduct, than to carry on his speculations87 in the companionship, and under the criticism, of a really superior woman. There is nothing comparable to it for keeping his thoughts within the limits of real things, and the actual facts of nature. [Pg 109] A woman seldom runs wild after an abstraction. The habitual88 direction of her mind to dealing with things as individuals rather than in groups, and (what is closely connected with it) her more lively interest in the present feelings of persons, which makes her consider first of all, in anything which claims to be applied89 to practice, in what manner persons will be affected90 by it—these two things make her extremely unlikely to put faith in any speculation which loses sight of individuals, and deals with things as if they existed for the benefit of some imaginary entity91, some mere creation of the mind, not resolvable into the feelings of living beings. Women's thoughts are thus as useful in giving reality to those of thinking men, as men's thoughts in giving width and largeness to those of women. In depth, as distinguished from breadth, I greatly doubt if even now, women, compared with men, are at any disadvantage.
If the existing mental characteristics of women are thus valuable even in aid of speculation, they are still more important, when speculation has done its work, for carrying out the results of speculation into practice. For the reasons already given, women are comparatively unlikely to fall into the common error of men, that of sticking to their rules in a case whose specialities either take it out of the class to which the rules are [Pg 110] applicable, or require a special adaptation of them. Let us now consider another of the admitted superiorities of clever women, greater quickness of apprehension. Is not this pre-eminently a quality which fits a person for practice? In action, everything continually depends upon deciding promptly92. In speculation, nothing does. A mere thinker can wait, can take time to consider, can collect additional evidence; he is not obliged to complete his philosophy at once, lest the opportunity should go by. The power of drawing the best conclusion possible from insufficient93 data is not indeed useless in philosophy; the construction of a provisional hypothesis consistent with all known facts is often the needful basis for further inquiry94. But this faculty is rather serviceable in philosophy, than the main qualification for it: and, for the auxiliary95 as well as for the main operation, the philosopher can allow himself any time he pleases. He is in no need of the capacity of doing rapidly what he does; what he rather needs is patience, to work on slowly until imperfect lights have become perfect, and a conjecture96 has ripened97 into a theorem. For those, on the contrary, whose business is with the fugitive98 and perishable—with individual facts, not kinds of facts—rapidity of thought is a qualification next only in importance to the power of thought itself. [Pg 111] He who has not his faculties under immediate75 command, in the contingencies99 of action, might as well not have them at all. He may be fit to criticize, but he is not fit to act. Now it is in this that women, and the men who are most like women, confessedly excel. The other sort of man, however pre-eminent may be his faculties, arrives slowly at complete command of them: rapidity of judgment and promptitude of judicious100 action, even in the things he knows best, are the gradual and late result of strenuous101 effort grown into habit.
It will be said, perhaps, that the greater nervous susceptibility of women is a disqualification for practice, in anything but domestic life, by rendering102 them mobile, changeable, too vehemently103 under the influence of the moment, incapable of dogged perseverance104, unequal and uncertain in the power of using their faculties. I think that these phrases sum up the greater part of the objections commonly made to the fitness of women for the higher class of serious business. Much of all this is the mere overflow105 of nervous energy run to waste, and would cease when the energy was directed to a definite end. Much is also the result of conscious or unconscious cultivation106; as we see by the almost total disappearance107 of “hysterics” and fainting fits, since they have gone out of fashion. Moreover, [Pg 112] when people are brought up, like many women of the higher classes (though less so in our own country than in any other) a kind of hot-house plants, shielded from the wholesome108 vicissitudes109 of air and temperature, and untrained in any of the occupations and exercises which give stimulus110 and development to the circulatory and muscular system, while their nervous system, especially in its emotional department, is kept in unnaturally111 active play; it is no wonder if those of them who do not die of consumption, grow up with constitutions liable to derangement112 from slight causes, both internal and external, and without stamina113 to support any task, physical or mental, requiring continuity of effort. But women brought up to work for their livelihood114 show none of these morbid115 characteristics, unless indeed they are chained to an excess of sedentary work in confined and unhealthy rooms. Women who in their early years have shared in the healthful physical education and bodily freedom of their brothers, and who obtain a sufficiency of pure air and exercise in after-life, very rarely have any excessive susceptibility of nerves which can disqualify them for active pursuits. There is indeed a certain proportion of persons, in both sexes, in whom an unusual degree of nervous sensibility is constitutional, and of so marked a character as to be the feature of their [Pg 113] organization which exercises the greatest influence over the whole character of the vital phenomena116. This constitution, like other physical conformations, is hereditary117, and is transmitted to sons as well as daughters; but it is possible, and probable, that the nervous temperament118 (as it is called) is inherited by a greater number of women than of men. We will assume this as a fact: and let me then ask, are men of nervous temperament found to be unfit for the duties and pursuits usually followed by men? If not, why should women of the same temperament be unfit for them? The peculiarities119 of the temperament are, no doubt, within certain limits, an obstacle to success in some employments, though an aid to it in others. But when the occupation is suitable to the temperament, and sometimes even when it is unsuitable, the most brilliant examples of success are continually given by the men of high nervous sensibility. They are distinguished in their practical manifestations120 chiefly by this, that being susceptible121 of a higher degree of excitement than those of another physical constitution, their powers when excited differ more than in the case of other people, from those shown in their ordinary state: they are raised, as it were, above themselves, and do things with ease which they are wholly incapable of at other times. But this lofty excitement is not, except in weak bodily constitutions, [Pg 114] a mere flash, which passes away immediately, leaving no permanent traces, and incompatible122 with persistent123 and steady pursuit of an object. It is the character of the nervous temperament to be capable of sustained excitement, holding out through long continued efforts. It is what is meant by spirit. It is what makes the high-bred racehorse run without slackening speed till he drops down dead. It is what has enabled so many delicate women to maintain the most sublime124 constancy not only at the stake, but through a long preliminary succession of mental and bodily tortures. It is evident that people of this temperament are particularly apt for what may be called the executive department of the leadership of mankind. They are the material of great orators125, great preachers, impressive diffusers of moral influences. Their constitution might be deemed less favourable126 to the qualities required from a statesman in the cabinet, or from a judge. It would be so, if the consequence necessarily followed that because people are excitable they must always be in a state of excitement. But this is wholly a question of training. Strong feeling is the instrument and element of strong self-control: but it requires to be cultivated in that direction. When it is, it forms not the heroes of impulse only, but those also of self-conquest. History and experience prove that [Pg 115] the most passionate127 characters are the most fanatically rigid128 in their feelings of duty, when their passion has been trained to act in that direction. The judge who gives a just decision in a case where his feelings are intensely interested on the other side, derives129 from that same strength of feeling the determined sense of the obligation of justice, which enables him to achieve this victory over himself. The capability130 of that lofty enthusiasm which takes the human being out of his every-day character, reacts upon the daily character itself. His aspirations131 and powers when he is in this exceptional state, become the type with which he compares, and by which he estimates, his sentiments and proceedings132 at other times: and his habitual purposes assume a character moulded by and assimilated to the moments of lofty excitement, although those, from the physical nature of a human being, can only be transient. Experience of races, as well as of individuals, does not show those of excitable temperament to be less fit, on the average, either for speculation or practice, than the more unexcitable. The French, and the Italians, are undoubtedly133 by nature more nervously134 excitable than the Teutonic races, and, compared at least with the English, they have a much greater habitual and daily emotional life: but have they been less great in science, in public business, in [Pg 116] legal and judicial135 eminence136, or in war? There is abundant evidence that the Greeks were of old, as their descendants and successors still are, one of the most excitable of the races of mankind. It is superfluous137 to ask, what among the achievements of men they did not excel in. The Romans, probably, as an equally southern people, had the same original temperament: but the stern character of their national discipline, like that of the Spartans138, made them an example of the opposite type of national character; the greater strength of their natural feelings being chiefly apparent in the intensity139 which the same original temperament made it possible to give to the artificial. If these cases exemplify what a naturally excitable people may be made, the Irish Celts afford one of the aptest examples of what they are when left to themselves; (if those can be said to be left to themselves who have been for centuries under the indirect influence of bad government, and the direct training of a Catholic hierarchy140 and of a sincere belief in the Catholic religion.) The Irish character must be considered, therefore, as an unfavourable case: yet, whenever the circumstances of the individual have been at all favourable, what people have shown greater capacity for the most varied141 and multifarious individual eminence? Like the French compared with the English, the Irish with the Swiss, the [Pg 117] Greeks or Italians compared with the German races, so women compared with men may be found, on the average, to do the same things with some variety in the particular kind of excellence. But, that they would do them fully as well on the whole, if their education and cultivation were adapted to correcting instead of aggravating142 the infirmities incident to their temperament, I see not the smallest reason to doubt.
Supposing it, however, to be true that women's minds are by nature more mobile than those of men, less capable of persisting long in the same continuous effort, more fitted for dividing their faculties among many things than for travelling in any one path to the highest point which can be reached by it: this may be true of women as they now are (though not without great and numerous exceptions), and may account for their having remained behind the highest order of men in precisely the things in which this absorption of the whole mind in one set of ideas and occupations may seem to be most requisite72. Still, this difference is one which can only affect the kind of excellence, not the excellence itself, or its practical worth: and it remains143 to be shown whether this exclusive working of a part of the mind, this absorption of the whole thinking faculty in a single subject, and concentration of it on a single work, is the [Pg 118] normal and healthful condition of the human faculties, even for speculative uses. I believe that what is gained in special development by this concentration, is lost in the capacity of the mind for the other purposes of life; and even in abstract thought, it is my decided opinion that the mind does more by frequently returning to a difficult problem, than by sticking to it without interruption. For the purposes, at all events, of practice, from its highest to its humblest departments, the capacity of passing promptly from one subject of consideration to another, without letting the active spring of the intellect run down between the two, is a power far more valuable; and this power women pre-eminently possess, by virtue144 of the very mobility145 of which they are accused. They perhaps have it from nature, but they certainly have it by training and education; for nearly the whole of the occupations of women consist in the management of small but multitudinous details, on each of which the mind cannot dwell even for a minute, but must pass on to other things, and if anything requires longer thought, must steal time at odd moments for thinking of it. The capacity indeed which women show for doing their thinking in circumstances and at times which almost any man would make an excuse to himself for not attempting it, has often been noticed: and a [Pg 119] woman's mind, though it may be occupied only with small things, can hardly ever permit itself to be vacant, as a man's so often is when not engaged in what he chooses to consider the business of his life. The business of a woman's ordinary life is things in general, and can as little cease to go on as the world to go round.
But (it is said) there is anatomical evidence of the superior mental capacity of men compared with women: they have a larger brain. I reply, that in the first place the fact itself is doubtful. It is by no means established that the brain of a woman is smaller than that of a man. If it is inferred merely because a woman's bodily frame generally is of less dimensions than a man's, this criterion would lead to strange consequences. A tall and large-boned man must on this showing be wonderfully superior in intelligence to a small man, and an elephant or a whale must prodigiously146 excel mankind. The size of the brain in human beings, anatomists say, varies much less than the size of the body, or even of the head, and the one cannot be at all inferred from the other. It is certain that some women have as large a brain as any man. It is within my knowledge that a man who had weighed many human brains, said that the heaviest he knew of, heavier even than Cuvier's (the heaviest previously147 [Pg 120] recorded,) was that of a woman. Next, I must observe that the precise relation which exists between the brain and the intellectual powers is not yet well understood, but is a subject of great dispute. That there is a very close relation we cannot doubt. The brain is certainly the material organ of thought and feeling: and (making abstraction of the great unsettled controversy148 respecting the appropriation149 of different parts of the brain to different mental faculties) I admit that it would be an anomaly, and an exception to all we know of the general laws of life and organization, if the size of the organ were wholly indifferent to the function; if no accession of power were derived150 from the greater magnitude of the instrument. But the exception and the anomaly would be fully as great if the organ exercised influence by its magnitude only. In all the more delicate operations of nature—of which those of the animated151 creation are the most delicate, and those of the nervous system by far the most delicate of these—differences in the effect depend as much on differences of quality in the physical agents, as on their quantity: and if the quality of an instrument is to be tested by the nicety and delicacy152 of the work it can do, the indications point to a greater average fineness of quality in the brain and nervous system of women than of men. [Pg 121] Dismissing abstract difference of quality, a thing difficult to verify, the efficiency of an organ is known to depend not solely153 on its size but on its activity: and of this we have an approximate measure in the energy with which the blood circulates through it, both the stimulus and the reparative force being mainly dependent on the circulation. It would not be surprising—it is indeed an hypothesis which accords well with the differences actually observed between the mental operations of the two sexes—if men on the average should have the advantage in the size of the brain, and women in activity of cerebral154 circulation. The results which conjecture, founded on analogy, would lead us to expect from this difference of organization, would correspond to some of those which we most commonly see. In the first place, the mental operations of men might be expected to be slower. They would neither be so prompt as women in thinking, nor so quick to feel. Large bodies take more time to get into full action. On the other hand, when once got thoroughly155 into play, men's brain would bear more work. It would be more persistent in the line first taken; it would have more difficulty in changing from one mode of action to another, but, in the one thing it was doing, it could go on longer without loss of power or sense of fatigue156. And do we not find that [Pg 122] the things in which men most excel women are those which require most plodding157 and long hammering at a single thought, while women do best what must be done rapidly? A woman's brain is sooner fatigued158, sooner exhausted159; but given the degree of exhaustion160, we should expect to find that it would recover itself sooner. I repeat that this speculation is entirely hypothetical; it pretends to no more than to suggest a line of enquiry. I have before repudiated161 the notion of its being yet certainly known that there is any natural difference at all in the average strength or direction of the mental capacities of the two sexes, much less what that difference is. Nor is it possible that this should be known, so long as the psychological laws of the formation of character have been so little studied, even in a general way, and in the particular case never scientifically applied at all; so long as the most obvious external causes of difference of character are habitually162 disregarded—left unnoticed by the observer, and looked down upon with a kind of supercilious163 contempt by the prevalent schools both of natural history and of mental philosophy: who, whether they look for the source of what mainly distinguishes human beings from one another, in the world of matter or in that of spirit, agree in running down those who prefer to explain these differences by the [Pg 123] different relations of human beings to society and life.
To so ridiculous an extent are the notions formed of the nature of women, mere empirical generalizations, framed, without philosophy or analysis, upon the first instances which present themselves, that the popular idea of it is different in different countries, according as the opinions and social circumstances of the country have given to the women living in it any speciality of development or non-development. An Oriental thinks that women are by nature peculiarly voluptuous164; see the violent abuse of them on this ground in Hindoo writings. An Englishman usually thinks that they are by nature cold. The sayings about women's fickleness165 are mostly of French origin; from the famous distich of Francis the First, upward and downward. In England it is a common remark, how much more constant women are than men. Inconstancy has been longer reckoned discreditable to a woman, in England than in France; and Englishwomen are besides, in their inmost nature, much more subdued166 to opinion. It may be remarked by the way, that Englishmen are in peculiarly unfavourable circumstances for attempting to judge what is or is not natural, not merely to women, but to men, or to human beings altogether, at least if they have only English experience to go upon: because there is no place where [Pg 124] human nature shows so little of its original lineaments. Both in a good and a bad sense, the English are farther from a state of nature than any other modern people. They are, more than any other people, a product of civilization and discipline. England is the country in which social discipline has most succeeded, not so much in conquering, as in suppressing, whatever is liable to conflict with it. The English, more than any other people, not only act but feel according to rule. In other countries, the taught opinion, or the requirement of society, may be the stronger power, but the promptings of the individual nature are always visible under it, and often resisting it: rule may be stronger than nature, but nature is still there. In England, rule has to a great degree substituted itself for nature. The greater part of life is carried on, not by following inclination167 under the control of rule, but by having no inclination but that of following a rule. Now this has its good side doubtless, though it has also a wretchedly bad one; but it must render an Englishman peculiarly ill-qualified to pass a judgment on the original tendencies of human nature from his own experience. The errors to which observers elsewhere are liable on the subject, are of a different character. An Englishman is ignorant respecting human nature, a Frenchman is prejudiced. An Englishman's errors are negative, a Frenchman's [Pg 125] positive. An Englishman fancies that things do not exist, because he never sees them; a Frenchman thinks they must always and necessarily exist, because he does see them. An Englishman does not know nature, because he has had no opportunity of observing it; a Frenchman generally knows a great deal of it, but often mistakes it, because he has only seen it sophisticated and distorted. For the artificial state superinduced by society disguises the natural tendencies of the thing which is the subject of observation, in two different ways: by extinguishing the nature, or by transforming it. In the one case there is but a starved residuum of nature remaining to be studied; in the other case there is much, but it may have expanded in any direction rather than that in which it would spontaneously grow.
I have said that it cannot now be known how much of the existing mental differences between men and women is natural, and how much artificial; whether there are any natural differences at all; or, supposing all artificial causes of difference to be withdrawn168, what natural character would be revealed. I am not about to attempt what I have pronounced impossible: but doubt does not forbid conjecture, and where certainty is unattainable, there may yet be the means of arriving at some degree of probability. The first point, the origin of the differences actually [Pg 126] observed, is the one most accessible to speculation; and I shall attempt to approach it, by the only path by which it can be reached; by tracing the mental consequences of external influences. We cannot isolate171 a human being from the circumstances of his condition, so as to ascertain172 experimentally what he would have been by nature; but we can consider what he is, and what his circumstances have been, and whether the one would have been capable of producing the other.
Let us take, then, the only marked case which observation affords, of apparent inferiority of women to men, if we except the merely physical one of bodily strength. No production in philosophy, science, or art, entitled to the first rank, has been the work of a woman. Is there any mode of accounting173 for this, without supposing that women are naturally incapable of producing them?
In the first place, we may fairly question whether experience has afforded sufficient grounds for an induction174. It is scarcely three generations since women, saving very rare exceptions, have begun to try their capacity in philosophy, science, or art. It is only in the present generation that their attempts have been at all numerous; and they are even now extremely few, everywhere but in England and France. It is a relevant question, whether a mind possessing the requisites of [Pg 127] first-rate eminence in speculation or creative art could have been expected, on the mere calculation of chances, to turn up during that lapse175 of time, among the women whose tastes and personal position admitted of their devoting themselves to these pursuits. In all things which there has yet been time for—in all but the very highest grades in the scale of excellence, especially in the department in which they have been longest engaged, literature (both prose and poetry)—women have done quite as much, have obtained fully as high prizes and as many of them, as could be expected from the length of time and the number of competitors. If we go back to the earlier period when very few women made the attempt, yet some of those few made it with distinguished success. The Greeks always accounted Sappho among their great poets; and we may well suppose that Myrtis, said to have been the teacher of Pindar, and Corinna, who five times bore away from him the prize of poetry, must at least have had sufficient merit to admit of being compared with that great name. Aspasia did not leave any philosophical176 writings; but it is an admitted fact that Socrates resorted to her for instruction, and avowed177 himself to have obtained it.
If we consider the works of women in modern times, and contrast them with those of men, either in the literary or the artistic178 department, [Pg 128] such inferiority as may be observed resolves itself essentially179 into one thing: but that is a most material one; deficiency of originality180. Not total deficiency; for every production of mind which is of any substantive181 value, has an originality of its own—is a conception of the mind itself, not a copy of something else. Thoughts original, in the sense of being unborrowed—of being derived from the thinker's own observations or intellectual processes—are abundant in the writings of women. But they have not yet produced any of those great and luminous182 new ideas which form an era in thought, nor those fundamentally new conceptions in art, which open a vista183 of possible effects not before thought of, and found a new school. Their compositions are mostly grounded on the existing fund of thought, and their creations do not deviate184 widely from existing types. This is the sort of inferiority which their works manifest: for in point of execution, in the detailed185 application of thought, and the perfection of style, there is no inferiority. Our best novelists in point of composition, and of the management of detail, have mostly been women; and there is not in all modern literature a more eloquent186 vehicle of thought than the style of Madame de Stael, nor, as a specimen187 of purely188 artistic excellence, anything superior to the prose of Madame Sand, whose style acts upon the [Pg 129] nervous system like a symphony of Haydn or Mozart. High originality of conception is, as I have said, what is chiefly wanting. And now to examine if there is any manner in which this deficiency can be accounted for.
Let us remember, then, so far as regards mere thought, that during all that period in the world's existence, and in the progress of cultivation, in which great and fruitful new truths could be arrived at by mere force of genius, with little previous study and accumulation of knowledge—during all that time women did not concern themselves with speculation at all. From the days of Hypatia to those of the Reformation, the illustrious Heloisa is almost the only woman to whom any such achievement might have been possible; and we know not how great a capacity of speculation in her may have been lost to mankind by the misfortunes of her life. Never since any considerable number of women have begun to cultivate serious thought, has originality been possible on easy terms. Nearly all the thoughts which can be reached by mere strength of original faculties, have long since been arrived at; and originality, in any high sense of the word, is now scarcely ever attained but by minds which have undergone elaborate discipline, and are deeply versed189 in the results of previous thinking. It is Mr. Maurice, I think, [Pg 130] who has remarked on the present age, that its most original thinkers are those who have known most thoroughly what had been thought by their predecessors190: and this will always henceforth be the case. Every fresh stone in the edifice192 has now to be placed on the top of so many others, that a long process of climbing, and of carrying up materials, has to be gone through by whoever aspires193 to take a share in the present stage of the work. How many women are there who have gone through any such process? Mrs. Somerville, alone perhaps of women, knows as much of mathematics as is now needful for making any considerable mathematical discovery: is it any proof of inferiority in women, that she has not happened to be one of the two or three persons who in her lifetime have associated their names with some striking advancement194 of the science? Two women, since political economy has been made a science, have known enough of it to write usefully on the subject: of how many of the innumerable men who have written on it during the same time, is it possible with truth to say more? If no woman has hitherto been a great historian, what woman has had the necessary erudition? If no woman is a great philologist195, what woman has studied Sanscrit and Slavonic, the Gothic of Ulphila and the Persic of the Zendavesta? Even in practical matters [Pg 131] we all know what is the value of the originality of untaught geniuses. It means, inventing over again in its rudimentary form something already invented and improved upon by many successive inventors. When women have had the preparation which all men now require to be eminently original, it will be time enough to begin judging by experience of their capacity for originality.
It no doubt often happens that a person, who has not widely and accurately196 studied the thoughts of others on a subject, has by natural sagacity a happy intuition, which he can suggest, but cannot prove, which yet when matured may be an important addition to knowledge: but even then, no justice can be done to it until some other person, who does possess the previous acquirements, takes it in hand, tests it, gives it a scientific or practical form, and fits it into its place among the existing truths of philosophy or science. Is it supposed that such felicitous197 thoughts do not occur to women? They occur by hundreds to every woman of intellect. But they are mostly lost, for want of a husband or friend who has the other knowledge which can enable him to estimate them properly and bring them before the world: and even when they are brought before it, they generally appear as his ideas, not their real author's. Who can tell how many of the most [Pg 132] original thoughts put forth191 by male writers, belong to a woman by suggestion, to themselves only by verifying and working out? If I may judge by my own case, a very large proportion indeed.
If we turn from pure speculation to literature in the narrow sense of the term, and the fine arts, there is a very obvious reason why women's literature is, in its general conception and in its main features, an imitation of men's. Why is the Roman literature, as critics proclaim to satiety198, not original, but an imitation of the Greek? Simply because the Greeks came first. If women lived in a different country from men, and had never read any of their writings, they would have had a literature of their own. As it is, they have not created one, because they found a highly advanced literature already created. If there had been no suspension of the knowledge of antiquity199, or if the Renaissance200 had occurred before the Gothic cathedrals were built, they never would have been built. We see that, in France and Italy, imitation of the ancient literature stopped the original development even after it had commenced. All women who write are pupils of the great male writers. A painter's early pictures, even if he be a Raffaelle, are undistinguishable in style from those of his master. Even a Mozart does not display his powerful originality in his [Pg 133] earliest pieces. What years are to a gifted individual, generations are to a mass. If women's literature is destined201 to have a different collective character from that of men, depending on any difference of natural tendencies, much longer time is necessary than has yet elapsed, before it can emancipate202 itself from the influence of accepted models, and guide itself by its own impulses. But if, as I believe, there will not prove to be any natural tendencies common to women, and distinguishing their genius from that of men, yet every individual writer among them has her individual tendencies, which at present are still subdued by the influence of precedent203 and example: and it will require generations more, before their individuality is sufficiently204 developed to make head against that influence.
It is in the fine arts, properly so called, that the prima facie evidence of inferior original powers in women at first sight appears the strongest: since opinion (it may be said) does not exclude them from these, but rather encourages them, and their education, instead of passing over this department, is in the affluent205 classes mainly composed of it. Yet in this line of exertion27 they have fallen still more short than in many others, of the highest eminence attained by men. This shortcoming, however, needs no other explanation than the familiar fact, more universally true [Pg 134] in the fine arts than in anything else; the vast superiority of professional persons over amateurs. Women in the educated classes are almost universally taught more or less of some branch or other of the fine arts, but not that they may gain their living or their social consequence by it. Women artists are all amateurs. The exceptions are only of the kind which confirm the general truth. Women are taught music, but not for the purpose of composing, only of executing it: and accordingly it is only as composers, that men, in music, are superior to women. The only one of the fine arts which women do follow, to any extent, as a profession, and an occupation for life, is the histrionic; and in that they are confessedly equal, if not superior, to men. To make the comparison fair, it should be made between the productions of women in any branch of art, and those of men not following it as a profession. In musical composition, for example, women surely have produced fully as good things as have ever been produced by male amateurs. There are now a few women, a very few, who practise painting as a profession, and these are already beginning to show quite as much talent as could be expected. Even male painters (pace Mr. Ruskin) have not made any very remarkable figure these last centuries, and it will be long before they do so. The reason why the old painters [Pg 135] were so greatly superior to the modern, is that a greatly superior class of men applied themselves to the art. In the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries the Italian painters were the most accomplished206 men of their age. The greatest of them were men of encyclop?dical acquirements and powers, like the great men of Greece. But in their times fine art was, to men's feelings and conceptions, among the grandest things in which a human being could excel; and by it men were made, what only political or military distinction now makes them, the companions of sovereigns, and the equals of the highest nobility. In the present age, men of anything like similar calibre find something more important to do, for their own fame and the uses of the modern world, than painting: and it is only now and then that a Reynolds or a Turner (of whose relative rank among eminent men I do not pretend to an opinion) applies himself to that art. Music belongs to a different order of things; it does not require the same general powers of mind, but seems more dependant207 on a natural gift: and it may be thought surprising that no one of the great musical composers has been a woman. But even this natural gift, to be made available for great creations, requires study, and professional devotion to the pursuit. The only countries which have produced first-rate composers, even of the male sex, are Germany and Italy—countries [Pg 136] in which, both in point of special and of general cultivation, women have remained far behind France and England, being generally (it may be said without exaggeration) very little educated, and having scarcely cultivated at all any of the higher faculties of mind. And in those countries the men who are acquainted with the principles of musical composition must be counted by hundreds, or more probably by thousands, the women barely by scores: so that here again, on the doctrine33 of averages, we cannot reasonably expect to see more than one eminent woman to fifty eminent men; and the last three centuries have not produced fifty eminent male composers either in Germany or in Italy.
There are other reasons, besides those which we have now given, that help to explain why women remain behind men, even in the pursuits which are open to both. For one thing, very few women have time for them. This may seem a paradox208; it is an undoubted social fact. The time and thoughts of every woman have to satisfy great previous demands on them for things practical. There is, first, the superintendence of the family and the domestic expenditure209, which occupies at least one woman in every family, generally the one of mature years and acquired experience; unless the family is so rich as to admit of delegating that task to hired agency, and submitting to all the [Pg 137] waste and malversation inseparable from that mode of conducting it. The superintendence of a household, even when not in other respects laborious210, is extremely onerous211 to the thoughts; it requires incessant212 vigilance, an eye which no detail escapes, and presents questions for consideration and solution, foreseen and unforeseen, at every hour of the day, from which the person responsible for them can hardly ever shake herself free. If a woman is of a rank and circumstances which relieve her in a measure from these cares, she has still devolving on her the management for the whole family of its intercourse213 with others—of what is called society, and the less the call made on her by the former duty, the greater is always the development of the latter: the dinner parties, concerts, evening parties, morning visits, letter writing, and all that goes with them. All this is over and above the engrossing214 duty which society imposes exclusively on women, of making themselves charming. A clever woman of the higher ranks finds nearly a sufficient employment of her talents in cultivating the graces of manner and the arts of conversation. To look only at the outward side of the subject: the great and continual exercise of thought which all women who attach any value to dressing215 well (I do not mean expensively, but with taste, and perception of natural and of artificial convenance) must bestow216 upon their own dress, perhaps also upon [Pg 138] that of their daughters, would alone go a great way towards achieving respectable results in art, or science, or literature, and does actually exhaust much of the time and mental power they might have to spare for either.[2] If it were possible that all this number of little practical interests (which are made great to them) should leave them either much leisure, or much energy and freedom of mind, to be devoted217 to art or speculation, they must have a much greater original supply of active faculty than the vast majority of men. But this is not all. Independently of the regular offices of life which devolve upon a woman, she is expected to have her time and faculties always at the disposal of everybody. If a man has not a profession to exempt218 him from such demands, still, if he has a pursuit, he offends nobody by devoting his time to it; occupation is [Pg 139] received as a valid excuse for his not answering to every casual demand which may be made on him. Are a woman's occupations, especially her chosen and voluntary ones, ever regarded as excusing her from any of what are termed the calls of society? Scarcely are her most necessary and recognised duties allowed as an exemption219. It requires an illness in the family, or something else out of the common way, to entitle her to give her own business the precedence over other people's amusement. She must always be at the beck and call of somebody, generally of everybody. If she has a study or a pursuit, she must snatch any short interval220 which accidentally occurs to be employed in it. A celebrated221 woman, in a work which I hope will some day be published, remarks truly that everything a woman does is done at odd times. Is it wonderful, then, if she does not attain21 the highest eminence in things which require consecutive222 attention, and the concentration on them of the chief interest of life? Such is philosophy, and such, above all, is art, in which, besides the devotion of the thoughts and feelings, the hand also must be kept in constant exercise to attain high skill.
There is another consideration to be added to all these. In the various arts and intellectual occupations, there is a degree of proficiency223 sufficient for living by it, and there is a higher [Pg 140] degree on which depend the great productions which immortalize a name. To the attainment224 of the former, there are adequate motives225 in the case of all who follow the pursuit professionally: the other is hardly ever attained where there is not, or where there has not been at some period of life, an ardent227 desire of celebrity228. Nothing less is commonly a sufficient stimulus to undergo the long and patient drudgery229, which, in the case even of the greatest natural gifts, is absolutely required for great eminence in pursuits in which we already possess so many splendid memorials of the highest genius. Now, whether the cause be natural or artificial, women seldom have this eagerness for fame. Their ambition is generally confined within narrower bounds. The influence they seek is over those who immediately surround them. Their desire is to be liked, loved, or admired, by those whom they see with their eyes: and the proficiency in knowledge, arts, and accomplishments230, which is sufficient for that, almost always contents them. This is a trait of character which cannot be left out of the account in judging of women as they are. I do not at all believe that it is inherent in women. It is only the natural result of their circumstances. The love of fame in men is encouraged by education and opinion: to “scorn delights and live laborious days” for its sake, is accounted the part [Pg 141] of “noble minds,” even if spoken of as their “last infirmity,” and is stimulated231 by the access which fame gives to all objects of ambition, including even the favour of women; while to women themselves all these objects are closed, and the desire of fame itself considered daring and unfeminine. Besides, how could it be that a woman's interests should not be all concentrated upon the impressions made on those who come into her daily life, when society has ordained232 that all her duties should be to them, and has contrived233 that all her comforts should depend on them? The natural desire of consideration from our fellow creatures is as strong in a woman as in a man; but society has so ordered things that public consideration is, in all ordinary cases, only attainable170 by her through the consideration of her husband or of her male relations, while her private consideration is forfeited234 by making herself individually prominent, or appearing in any other character than that of an appendage235 to men. Whoever is in the least capable of estimating the influence on the mind of the entire domestic and social position and the whole habit of a life, must easily recognise in that influence a complete explanation of nearly all the apparent differences between women and men, including the whole of those which imply any inferiority. [Pg 142]
As for moral differences, considered as distinguished from intellectual, the distinction commonly drawn169 is to the advantage of women. They are declared to be better than men; an empty compliment, which must provoke a bitter smile from every woman of spirit, since there is no other situation in life in which it is the established order, and considered quite natural and suitable, that the better should obey the worse. If this piece of idle talk is good for anything, it is only as an admission by men, of the corrupting236 influence of power; for that is certainly the only truth which the fact, if it be a fact, either proves or illustrates237. And it is true that servitude, except when it actually brutalizes, though corrupting to both, is less so to the slaves than to the slave-masters. It is wholesomer for the moral nature to be restrained, even by arbitrary power, than to be allowed to exercise arbitrary power without restraint. Women, it is said, seldomer fall under the penal239 law—contribute a much smaller number of offenders240 to the criminal calendar, than men. I doubt not that the same thing may be said, with the same truth, of negro slaves. Those who are under the control of others cannot often commit crimes, unless at the command and for the purposes of their masters. I do not know a more signal instance of the blindness with which the world, including the [Pg 143] herd241 of studious men, ignore and pass over all the influences of social circumstances, than their silly depreciation242 of the intellectual, and silly panegyrics243 on the moral, nature of women.
The complimentary244 dictum about women's superior moral goodness may be allowed to pair off with the disparaging245 one respecting their greater liability to moral bias246. Women, we are told, are not capable of resisting their personal partialities: their judgment in grave affairs is warped247 by their sympathies and antipathies248. Assuming it to be so, it is still to be proved that women are oftener misled by their personal feelings than men by their personal interests. The chief difference would seem in that case to be, that men are led from the course of duty and the public interest by their regard for themselves, women (not being allowed to have private interests of their own) by their regard for somebody else. It is also to be considered, that all the education which women receive from society inculcates on them the feeling that the individuals connected with them are the only ones to whom they owe any duty—the only ones whose interest they are called upon to care for; while, as far as education is concerned, they are left strangers even to the elementary ideas which are presupposed in any intelligent regard for larger interests or higher moral objects. The complaint [Pg 144] against them resolves itself merely into this, that they fulfil only too faithfully the sole duty which they are taught, and almost the only one which they are permitted to practise.
The concessions249 of the privileged to the unprivileged are so seldom brought about by any better motive226 than the power of the unprivileged to extort250 them, that any arguments against the prerogative251 of sex are likely to be little attended to by the generality, as long as they are able to say to themselves that women do not complain of it. That fact certainly enables men to retain the unjust privilege some time longer; but does not render it less unjust. Exactly the same thing may be said of the women in the harem of an Oriental: they do not complain of not being allowed the freedom of European women. They think our women insufferably bold and unfeminine. How rarely it is that even men complain of the general order of society; and how much rarer still would such complaint be, if they did not know of any different order existing anywhere else. Women do not complain of the general lot of women; or rather they do, for plaintive252 elegies253 on it are very common in the writings of women, and were still more so as long as the lamentations could not be suspected of having any practical object. Their complaints are like the complaints which men make of the [Pg 145] general unsatisfactoriness of human life; they are not meant to imply blame, or to plead for any change. But though women do not complain of the power of husbands, each complains of her own husband, or of the husbands of her friends. It is the same in all other cases of servitude, at least in the commencement of the emancipatory254 movement. The serfs did not at first complain of the power of their lords, but only of their tyranny. The Commons began by claiming a few municipal privileges; they next asked an exemption for themselves from being taxed without their own consent; but they would at that time have thought it a great presumption to claim any share in the king's sovereign authority. The case of women is now the only case in which to rebel against established rules is still looked upon with the same eyes as was formerly255 a subject's claim to the right of rebelling against his king. A woman who joins in any movement which her husband disapproves256, makes herself a martyr257, without even being able to be an apostle, for the husband can legally put a stop to her apostleship. Women cannot be expected to devote themselves to the emancipation258 of women, until men in considerable number are prepared to join with them in the undertaking259.
1: Especially is this true if we take into consideration Asia as well as Europe. If a Hindoo principality is strongly, vigilantly260, and economically governed; if order is preserved without oppression; if cultivation is extending, and the people prosperous, in three cases out of four that principality is under a woman's rule. This fact, to me an entirely unexpected one, I have collected from a long official knowledge of Hindoo governments. There are many such instances: for though, by Hindoo institutions, a woman cannot reign46, she is the legal regent of a kingdom during the minority of the heir; and minorities are frequent, the lives of the male rulers being so often prematurely261 terminated through the effect of inactivity and sensual excesses. When we consider that these princesses have never been seen in public, have never conversed262 with any man not of their own family except from behind a curtain, that they do not read, and if they did, there is no book in their languages which can give them the smallest instruction on political affairs; the example they afford of the natural capacity of women for government is very striking.
2: “It appears to be the same right turn of mind which enables a man to acquire the truth, or the just idea of what is right, in the ornaments263, as in the more stable principles of art. It has still the same centre of perfection, though it is the centre of a smaller circle.—To illustrate238 this by the fashion of dress, in which there is allowed to be a good or bad taste. The component264 parts of dress are continually changing from great to little, from short to long; but the general form still remains: it is still the same general dress which is comparatively fixed265, though on a very slender foundation; but it is on this which fashion must rest. He who invents with the most success, or dresses in the best taste, would probably, from the same sagacity employed to greater purposes, have discovered equal skill, or have formed the same correct taste, in the highest labours of art.”—Sir Joshua Reynolds' Discourses266, Disc. vii.
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politic
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| adj.有智虑的；精明的；v.从政 | |
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injustice
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| n.非正义，不公正，不公平，侵犯（别人的）权利 | |
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lucrative
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| adj.赚钱的，可获利的 | |
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ordaining
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| v.任命（某人）为牧师( ordain的现在分词 )；授予（某人）圣职；（上帝、法律等）命令；判定 | |
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ordain
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| vi.颁发命令；vt.命令，授以圣职，注定，任命 | |
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interdicted
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mere
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justify
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| vt.证明…正当(或有理)，为…辩护 | |
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faculties
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| n.能力( faculty的名词复数 )；全体教职员；技巧；院 | |
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incapable
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aspire
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| vi.(to，after)渴望，追求，有志于 | |
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plausible
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| adj.似真实的，似乎有理的，似乎可信的 | |
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valid
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| adj.有确实根据的；有效的；正当的，合法的 | |
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eminent
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| adj.显赫的，杰出的，有名的，优良的 | |
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15
mediocre
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| adj.平常的，普通的 | |
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16
decided
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| adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的 | |
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17
apprehension
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| n.理解，领悟；逮捕，拘捕；忧虑 | |
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18
vocation
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| n.职业，行业 | |
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19
determined
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| adj.坚定的；有决心的 | |
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20
fully
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| adv.完全地，全部地，彻底地；充分地 | |
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21
attain
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| vt.达到，获得，完成 | |
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22
attained
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| （通常经过努力）实现( attain的过去式和过去分词 )； 达到； 获得； 达到（某年龄、水平、状况） | |
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23
detriment
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| n.损害；损害物，造成损害的根源 | |
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24
qualified
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| adj.合格的，有资格的，胜任的，有限制的 | |
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25
distinguished
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| adj.卓越的，杰出的，著名的 | |
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26
stimulating
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| adj.有启发性的，能激发人思考的 | |
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27
exertion
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| n.尽力，努力 | |
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28
exertions
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|
| n.努力( exertion的名词复数 )；费力；（能力、权力等的）运用；行使 | |
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29
entirely
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| ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地 | |
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30
suffrage
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|
| n.投票，选举权，参政权 | |
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31
oligarchy
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|
| n.寡头政治 | |
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32
justification
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| n.正当的理由；辩解的理由 | |
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33
doctrine
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|
| n.教义；主义；学说 | |
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34
doctrines
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|
| n.教条( doctrine的名词复数 )；教义；学说；（政府政策的）正式声明 | |
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35
justified
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| a.正当的，有理的 | |
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36
irrelevant
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|
| adj.不恰当的，无关系的，不相干的 | |
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37
radical
|
|
| n.激进份子，原子团，根号；adj.根本的，激进的，彻底的 | |
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38
sedulously
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|
| ad.孜孜不倦地 | |
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39
humble
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|
| adj.谦卑的，恭顺的；地位低下的；v.降低，贬低 | |
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40
conclusive
|
|
| adj.最后的，结论的；确凿的，消除怀疑的 | |
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41
excellence
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|
| n.优秀，杰出，(pl.)优点，美德 | |
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42
peculiar
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|
| adj.古怪的，异常的；特殊的，特有的 | |
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43
conspicuous
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|
| adj.明眼的，惹人注目的；炫耀的，摆阔气的 | |
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44
apparently
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|
| adv.显然地；表面上，似乎 | |
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45
eminently
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|
| adv.突出地；显著地；不寻常地 | |
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46
reign
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|
| n.统治时期，统治，支配，盛行；v.占优势 | |
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47
reigning
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|
| adj.统治的，起支配作用的 | |
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48
remarkable
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|
| adj.显著的，异常的，非凡的，值得注意的 | |
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49
vigour
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| （=vigor）n.智力，体力，精力 | |
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50
swells
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|
| 增强( swell的第三人称单数 )； 肿胀； （使）凸出； 充满（激情） | |
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51
propensities
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|
| n.倾向，习性( propensity的名词复数 ) | |
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52
monarch
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|
| n.帝王，君主，最高统治者 | |
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53
alleged
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| a.被指控的，嫌疑的 | |
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54
parity
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|
| n.平价，等价，比价，对等 | |
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55
chancellor
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|
| n.(英)大臣；法官；(德、奥)总理；大学校长 | |
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56
precisely
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|
| adv.恰好，正好，精确地，细致地 | |
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57
supreme
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|
| adj.极度的，最重要的；至高的，最高的 | |
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58
advisers
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| 顾问，劝告者( adviser的名词复数 )； （指导大学新生学科问题等的）指导教授 | |
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59
judgment
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|
| n.审判；判断力，识别力，看法，意见 | |
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60
dealing
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| n.经商方法，待人态度 | |
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61
administrators
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|
| n.管理者( administrator的名词复数 )；有管理（或行政）才能的人；（由遗嘱检验法庭指定的）遗产管理人；奉派暂管主教教区的牧师 | |
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62
improper
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|
| adj.不适当的，不合适的，不正确的，不合礼仪的 | |
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63
aptitudes
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| （学习方面的）才能，资质，天资( aptitude的名词复数 ) | |
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64
aptitude
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| n.(学习方面的)才能，资质，天资 | |
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65
presumption
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|
| n.推测，可能性，冒昧，放肆，[法律]推定 | |
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66
unnatural
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|
| adj.不自然的；反常的 | |
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67
bent
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|
| n.爱好，癖好；adj.弯的；决心的，一心的 | |
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68
generalizations
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|
| 一般化( generalization的名词复数 )； 普通化； 归纳； 概论 | |
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69
prudence
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| n.谨慎，精明，节俭 | |
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70
gathering
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| n.集会，聚会，聚集 | |
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71
requisites
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| n.必要的事物( requisite的名词复数 ) | |
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72
requisite
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|
| adj.需要的，必不可少的；n.必需品 | |
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73
skilful
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|
| (=skillful)adj.灵巧的，熟练的 | |
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74
deficient
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|
| adj.不足的，不充份的，有缺陷的 | |
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75
immediate
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|
| adj.立即的；直接的，最接近的；紧靠的 | |
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76
speculative
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|
| adj.思索性的，暝想性的，推理的 | |
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77
faculty
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|
| n.才能；学院，系；(学院或系的)全体教学人员 | |
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78
discriminate
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|
| v.区别，辨别，区分；有区别地对待 | |
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79
rectifying
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|
| 改正，矫正( rectify的现在分词 )； 精馏； 蒸流； 整流 | |
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80
random
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|
| adj.随机的；任意的；n.偶然的(或随便的)行动 | |
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81
counteractive
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|
| 反对的，反作用的，抵抗的 | |
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82
aberration
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|
| n.离开正路，脱离常规，色差 | |
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83
legitimate
|
|
| adj.合法的，合理的，合乎逻辑的；v.使合法 | |
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84
speculation
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|
| n.思索，沉思；猜测；投机 | |
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85
animate
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|
| v.赋于生命，鼓励；adj.有生命的，有生气的 | |
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86
entanglement
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|
| n.纠缠，牵累 | |
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87
speculations
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|
| n.投机买卖( speculation的名词复数 )；思考；投机活动；推断 | |
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88
habitual
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|
| adj.习惯性的；通常的，惯常的 | |
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89
applied
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|
| adj.应用的；v.应用，适用 | |
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90
affected
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|
| adj.不自然的，假装的 | |
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91
entity
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| n.实体，独立存在体，实际存在物 | |
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92
promptly
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|
| adv.及时地，敏捷地 | |
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93
insufficient
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|
| adj.(for，of)不足的，不够的 | |
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94
inquiry
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|
| n.打听，询问，调查，查问 | |
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95
auxiliary
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|
| adj.辅助的，备用的 | |
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96
conjecture
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|
| n./v.推测，猜测 | |
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97
ripened
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|
| v.成熟，使熟( ripen的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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98
fugitive
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|
| adj.逃亡的，易逝的；n.逃犯，逃亡者 | |
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99
contingencies
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|
| n.偶然发生的事故，意外事故( contingency的名词复数 )；以备万一 | |
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100
judicious
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|
| adj.明智的，明断的，能作出明智决定的 | |
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101
strenuous
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|
| adj.奋发的，使劲的；紧张的；热烈的，狂热的 | |
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102
rendering
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| n.表现，描写 | |
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103
vehemently
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|
| adv. 热烈地 | |
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104
perseverance
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|
| n.坚持不懈，不屈不挠 | |
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105
overflow
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| v.(使)外溢，(使)溢出；溢出，流出，漫出 | |
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106
cultivation
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| n.耕作，培养，栽培（法），养成 | |
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107
disappearance
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| n.消失，消散，失踪 | |
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108
wholesome
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|
| adj.适合；卫生的；有益健康的；显示身心健康的 | |
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109
vicissitudes
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|
| n.变迁，世事变化；变迁兴衰( vicissitude的名词复数 )；盛衰兴废 | |
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110
stimulus
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|
| n.刺激，刺激物，促进因素，引起兴奋的事物 | |
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111
unnaturally
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|
| adv.违反习俗地；不自然地；勉强地；不近人情地 | |
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112
derangement
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| n.精神错乱 | |
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113
stamina
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| n.体力；精力；耐力 | |
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114
livelihood
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| n.生计，谋生之道 | |
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115
morbid
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|
| adj.病的；致病的；病态的；可怕的 | |
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116
phenomena
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| n.现象 | |
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117
hereditary
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| adj.遗传的，遗传性的，可继承的，世袭的 | |
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118
temperament
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| n.气质，性格，性情 | |
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119
peculiarities
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| n. 特质, 特性, 怪癖, 古怪 | |
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120
manifestations
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| n.表示，显示（manifestation的复数形式） | |
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121
susceptible
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| adj.过敏的，敏感的；易动感情的，易受感动的 | |
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122
incompatible
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| adj.不相容的，不协调的，不相配的 | |
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123
persistent
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| adj.坚持不懈的，执意的；持续的 | |
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124
sublime
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| adj.崇高的，伟大的；极度的，不顾后果的 | |
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125
orators
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| n.演说者，演讲家( orator的名词复数 ) | |
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126
favourable
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|
| adj.赞成的，称赞的，有利的，良好的，顺利的 | |
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127
passionate
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| adj.热情的，热烈的，激昂的，易动情的，易怒的，性情暴躁的 | |
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128
rigid
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|
| adj.严格的，死板的；刚硬的，僵硬的 | |
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129
derives
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|
| v.得到( derive的第三人称单数 )；（从…中）得到获得；源于；（从…中）提取 | |
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130
capability
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| n.能力；才能；(pl)可发展的能力或特性等 | |
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131
aspirations
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|
| 强烈的愿望( aspiration的名词复数 )； 志向； 发送气音； 发 h 音 | |
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132
proceedings
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| n.进程，过程，议程；诉讼(程序)；公报 | |
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133
undoubtedly
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| adv.确实地，无疑地 | |
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134
nervously
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| adv.神情激动地，不安地 | |
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135
judicial
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| adj.司法的，法庭的，审判的，明断的，公正的 | |
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136
eminence
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| n.卓越，显赫；高地，高处；名家 | |
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137
superfluous
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|
| adj.过多的，过剩的，多余的 | |
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138
spartans
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| n.斯巴达（spartan的复数形式） | |
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139
intensity
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| n.强烈，剧烈；强度；烈度 | |
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140
hierarchy
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|
| n.等级制度；统治集团，领导层 | |
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141
varied
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|
| adj.多样的，多变化的 | |
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142
aggravating
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| adj.恼人的，讨厌的 | |
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143
remains
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|
| n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹 | |
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144
virtue
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|
| n.德行，美德；贞操；优点；功效，效力 | |
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145
mobility
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|
| n.可动性，变动性，情感不定 | |
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146
prodigiously
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| adv.异常地，惊人地，巨大地 | |
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147
previously
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| adv.以前，先前（地） | |
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148
controversy
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| n.争论，辩论，争吵 | |
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149
appropriation
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| n.拨款，批准支出 | |
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150
derived
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| vi.起源；由来；衍生；导出v.得到( derive的过去式和过去分词 )；（从…中）得到获得；源于；（从…中）提取 | |
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151
animated
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| adj.生气勃勃的，活跃的，愉快的 | |
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152
delicacy
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| n.精致，细微，微妙，精良；美味，佳肴 | |
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153
solely
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| adv.仅仅，唯一地 | |
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154
cerebral
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| adj.脑的，大脑的；有智力的，理智型的 | |
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155
thoroughly
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| adv.完全地，彻底地，十足地 | |
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156
fatigue
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| n.疲劳，劳累 | |
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157
plodding
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| a.proceeding in a slow or dull way | |
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158
fatigued
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| adj. 疲乏的 | |
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159
exhausted
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| adj.极其疲惫的，精疲力尽的 | |
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160
exhaustion
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| n.耗尽枯竭，疲惫，筋疲力尽，竭尽，详尽无遗的论述 | |
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161
repudiated
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| v.（正式地）否认( repudiate的过去式和过去分词 )；拒绝接受；拒绝与…往来；拒不履行（法律义务） | |
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162
habitually
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| ad.习惯地，通常地 | |
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163
supercilious
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| adj.目中无人的，高傲的；adv.高傲地；n.高傲 | |
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164
voluptuous
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| adj.肉欲的，骄奢淫逸的 | |
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165
fickleness
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| n.易变；无常；浮躁；变化无常 | |
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166
subdued
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| adj. 屈服的，柔和的，减弱的 动词subdue的过去式和过去分词 | |
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167
inclination
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| n.倾斜；点头；弯腰；斜坡；倾度；倾向；爱好 | |
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168
withdrawn
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| vt.收回；使退出；vi.撤退，退出 | |
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169
drawn
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| v.拖，拉，拔出；adj.憔悴的，紧张的 | |
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170
attainable
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| a.可达到的，可获得的 | |
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171
isolate
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| vt.使孤立，隔离 | |
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172
ascertain
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| vt.发现，确定，查明，弄清 | |
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173
accounting
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| n.会计，会计学，借贷对照表 | |
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174
induction
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| n.感应，感应现象 | |
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175
lapse
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| n.过失，流逝，失效，抛弃信仰，间隔；vi.堕落，停止，失效，流逝；vt.使失效 | |
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176
philosophical
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| adj.哲学家的，哲学上的，达观的 | |
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177
avowed
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| adj.公开声明的，承认的v.公开声明，承认( avow的过去式和过去分词) | |
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178
artistic
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| adj.艺术(家)的，美术(家)的；善于艺术创作的 | |
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179
essentially
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| adv.本质上，实质上，基本上 | |
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180
originality
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| n.创造力，独创性；新颖 | |
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181
substantive
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| adj.表示实在的；本质的、实质性的；独立的；n.实词，实名词；独立存在的实体 | |
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182
luminous
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| adj.发光的，发亮的；光明的；明白易懂的；有启发的 | |
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183
vista
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| n.远景，深景，展望，回想 | |
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184
deviate
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| v.(from)背离，偏离 | |
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185
detailed
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| adj.详细的，详尽的，极注意细节的，完全的 | |
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186
eloquent
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| adj.雄辩的，口才流利的；明白显示出的 | |
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187
specimen
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| n.样本，标本 | |
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188
purely
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| adv.纯粹地，完全地 | |
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189
versed
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| adj. 精通，熟练 | |
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190
predecessors
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| n.前任( predecessor的名词复数 )；前辈；（被取代的）原有事物；前身 | |
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191
forth
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| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
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192
edifice
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| n.宏伟的建筑物(如宫殿，教室) | |
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193
aspires
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| v.渴望，追求( aspire的第三人称单数 ) | |
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194
advancement
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| n.前进，促进，提升 | |
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195
philologist
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| n.语言学者，文献学者 | |
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196
accurately
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| adv.准确地，精确地 | |
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197
felicitous
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| adj.恰当的，巧妙的；n.恰当，贴切 | |
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198
satiety
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| n.饱和；(市场的)充分供应 | |
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199
antiquity
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| n.古老；高龄；古物，古迹 | |
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200
renaissance
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| n.复活，复兴，文艺复兴 | |
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201
destined
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| adj.命中注定的；(for)以…为目的地的 | |
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202
emancipate
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| v.解放，解除 | |
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203
precedent
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| n.先例，前例；惯例；adj.在前的，在先的 | |
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204
sufficiently
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| adv.足够地，充分地 | |
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205
affluent
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| adj.富裕的，富有的，丰富的，富饶的 | |
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206
accomplished
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| adj.有才艺的；有造诣的；达到了的 | |
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207
dependant
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| n.依靠的，依赖的，依赖他人生活者 | |
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208
paradox
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| n.似乎矛盾却正确的说法；自相矛盾的人(物) | |
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209
expenditure
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| n.(时间、劳力、金钱等)支出；使用，消耗 | |
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210
laborious
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| adj.吃力的，努力的，不流畅 | |
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211
onerous
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| adj.繁重的 | |
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212
incessant
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| adj.不停的，连续的 | |
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213
intercourse
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| n.性交；交流，交往，交际 | |
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214
engrossing
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| adj.使人全神贯注的，引人入胜的v.使全神贯注( engross的现在分词 ) | |
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215
dressing
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| n.(食物)调料；包扎伤口的用品，敷料 | |
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216
bestow
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| v.把…赠与，把…授予；花费 | |
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217
devoted
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| adj.忠诚的，忠实的，热心的，献身于...的 | |
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218
exempt
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| adj.免除的；v.使免除；n.免税者，被免除义务者 | |
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219
exemption
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| n.豁免，免税额，免除 | |
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220
interval
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| n.间隔，间距；幕间休息，中场休息 | |
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221
celebrated
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| adj.有名的，声誉卓著的 | |
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222
consecutive
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| adj.连续的，联贯的，始终一贯的 | |
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223
proficiency
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| n.精通，熟练，精练 | |
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224
attainment
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| n.达到，到达；［常pl.］成就，造诣 | |
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225
motives
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| n.动机，目的( motive的名词复数 ) | |
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226
motive
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| n.动机，目的；adv.发动的，运动的 | |
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227
ardent
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| adj.热情的，热烈的，强烈的，烈性的 | |
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228
celebrity
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| n.名人，名流；著名，名声，名望 | |
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229
drudgery
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| n.苦工，重活，单调乏味的工作 | |
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230
accomplishments
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| n.造诣；完成( accomplishment的名词复数 )；技能；成绩；成就 | |
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231
stimulated
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| a.刺激的 | |
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232
ordained
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| v.任命（某人）为牧师( ordain的过去式和过去分词 )；授予（某人）圣职；（上帝、法律等）命令；判定 | |
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233
contrived
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| adj.不自然的，做作的；虚构的 | |
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234
forfeited
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| （因违反协议、犯规、受罚等）丧失，失去( forfeit的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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235
appendage
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| n.附加物 | |
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236
corrupting
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| （使）败坏( corrupt的现在分词 )； （使）腐化； 引起（计算机文件等的）错误； 破坏 | |
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237
illustrates
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| 给…加插图( illustrate的第三人称单数 )； 说明； 表明； （用示例、图画等）说明 | |
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238
illustrate
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| v.举例说明，阐明；图解，加插图 | |
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239
penal
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| adj.刑罚的；刑法上的 | |
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240
offenders
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| n.冒犯者( offender的名词复数 )；犯规者；罪犯；妨害…的人（或事物） | |
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241
herd
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| n.兽群，牧群；vt.使集中，把…赶在一起 | |
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242
depreciation
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| n.价值低落，贬值，蔑视，贬低 | |
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243
panegyrics
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| n.赞美( panegyric的名词复数 )；称颂；颂词；颂扬的演讲或文章 | |
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244
complimentary
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| adj.赠送的，免费的，赞美的，恭维的 | |
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245
disparaging
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| adj.轻蔑的，毁谤的v.轻视( disparage的现在分词 )；贬低；批评；非难 | |
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246
bias
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| n.偏见，偏心，偏袒；vt.使有偏见 | |
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247
warped
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| adj.反常的；乖戾的；（变）弯曲的；变形的v.弄弯，变歪( warp的过去式和过去分词 )；使（行为等）不合情理，使乖戾， | |
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248
antipathies
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| 反感( antipathy的名词复数 )； 引起反感的事物； 憎恶的对象； （在本性、倾向等方面的）不相容 | |
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249
concessions
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| n.（尤指由政府或雇主给予的）特许权( concession的名词复数 )；承认；减价；（在某地的）特许经营权 | |
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250
extort
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| v.勒索，敲诈，强要 | |
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251
prerogative
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| n.特权 | |
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252
plaintive
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| adj.可怜的，伤心的 | |
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253
elegies
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| n.哀歌，挽歌( elegy的名词复数 ) | |
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254
emancipatory
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| adj.解放的，有助于解放的 | |
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255
formerly
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| adv.从前，以前 | |
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256
disapproves
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| v.不赞成( disapprove的第三人称单数 ) | |
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257
martyr
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| n.烈士，殉难者；vt.杀害，折磨，牺牲 | |
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258
emancipation
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| n.（从束缚、支配下）解放 | |
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259
undertaking
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| n.保证，许诺，事业 | |
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260
vigilantly
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| adv.警觉地，警惕地 | |
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261
prematurely
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| adv.过早地，贸然地 | |
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262
conversed
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| v.交谈，谈话( converse的过去式 ) | |
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263
ornaments
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| n.装饰( ornament的名词复数 )；点缀；装饰品；首饰v.装饰，点缀，美化( ornament的第三人称单数 ) | |
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264
component
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| n.组成部分，成分，元件；adj.组成的，合成的 | |
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265
fixed
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| adj.固定的，不变的，准备好的；(计算机)固定的 | |
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266
discourses
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| 论文( discourse的名词复数 )； 演说； 讲道； 话语 | |
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