"THE RIGHTS OF WOMAN" - читать интересную книгу автора (Wollstonecraft Mary)

than affectionate wives and rational mothers; and the understanding
of the sex has been so bubbled by this specious homage, that the
civilised women of the present century, with a few exceptions, are
only anxious to inspire love, when they ought to cherish a nobler
ambition, and by their abilities and virtues exact respect.

In a treatise, therefore, on female rights and manners, the works
which have been particularly written for their improve- ment must
not be overlooked, especially when it is asserted, in direct terms,
that the minds of women are enfeebled by false refinement; that the
books of instruction, written by men of genius, have had the same
tendency as more frivolous productions; and that, in the true style
of Mahometanism, they are treated as a kind of subordinate beings,
and not as a part of the human species, when improvable reason is
allowed to be the dignified distinction which raises men above the
brute creation, and puts a natural sceptre in a feeble hand.

Yet, because I am a woman, I would not lead my readers to suppose
that I mean violently to agitate the contested question respecting
the quality or inferiority of the sex; but as the subject lies in
my way, and I cannot pass it over without subjecting the main
tendency of my reasoning to misconstruction, I shall stop a moment
to deliver, in a few words, my opinion. In the government of the
physical world it is observable that the female in point of
strength is, in general, inferior to the male. This is the law of
Nature; and it does not appear to be suspended or abrogated in
favour of woman. A degree of physical superiority cannot,
therefore, be denied, and it is a noble prerogative! But not
content with this natural preeminence, men endeavour to sink us
still lower, merely to render us alluring objects for a moment; and
women, intoxicated by the adoration which men, under the influence
of their senses, pay them, do not seek to obtain a durable interest
in their hearts, or to become the friends of the fellow-creatures
who find amusement in their society.

I am aware of an obvious inference. From every quarter have I heard
exclamations against masculine women, but where are they to be
found? If by this appellation men mean to inveigh against, their
ardour in hunting, shooting, and gaming, I shall most cordially
join in the cry; but if it be against the imitation of manly
virtues, or, more properly speaking, the attainment of those
talents and virtues, the exercise of which ennobles the human
character, and which raises females in the scale of animal being,
when they are comprehensively termed mankind, all those who view
them with a philosophic eye must, I should think, wish with me,
that they may every day grow more and more masculine.

This discussion naturally divides the subject. I shall first
consider women in the gland light of human creatures, who in common
with men, are placed on this earth to unfold their faculties; and