Mary Wollstonecraft and A Vindication of the Rights of Woman, 1792

[Music] the conduct and manners of women evidently prove that their minds are not in a healthy state for like the flowers which are planted in too richer soil strength and usefulness are sacrificed to beauty and the flaunting leaves after having pleased a fastidious eye fade disregarded on the stalk long before the season when they ought to have arrived at maturity one cause of this barren blooming i attribute to a full system of education gathered from the books written on this subject by men who considering females rather as women than human creatures have been more anxious to make them alluring mistresses than affectionate wives and rational mothers the understanding of the sex has been so bubbled by this specious homage that the civilized women of the present century with the 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 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 favor of woman a degree of physical superiority cannot therefore be denied and it is a noble prerogative not content with this natural preeminence men endeavor 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 my own sex i hope will excuse me if i treat them like rational creatures instead of flattering their fascinating graces and viewing them as if they were in a state of perpetual childhood unable to stand alone i earnestly wish to point out in what true dignity and human happiness consists i wish to persuade women to endeavor to acquire strength both of mind and body and to convince them that the soft phrases susceptibility of heart delicacy of sentiment and refinement of tastes are almost synonymous with epithets of weakness and that those beings who are only the objects of pity and that kind of love which has been termed its sister will soon become objects of contempt dismissing then those pretty feminine phrases which the men condescendingly use to soften our slavish dependence i wish to show that elegance is inferior to virtue that the first object of laudable ambition is to obtain a character as a human being regardless of the distinction of sex you