" WOMAN'S RIGHTS."

" Equality knows no difference of sex in its vocabulary, the word 'man' must be understood in a general and not a special sense. The law of equal liberty for all, must evidently be applied to the whole human race, the female as well as the male portion of it. The same direct argument which fixes this law for man, must have the same weight with regard to woman, for the same moral idea which places man in relation to this law, exists in the same manner for woman; the different rights, therefore, which can be derived from it are due to both sexes equally.

" This might seem to be so evident a truth that it needed only to be stated to meet with a general acknowledgement. There are, notwithstanding, many who, either silently or with many words, differ from this opinion. For what reason they do so cannot he perceived ; but, at all events, they assume the principle, that it is the will of God man should be happy, and that what we call rights, is in accordance with this principle and derived from it. It now remains for them to prove why differences in the bodily organisation, and some unimportant differences of mind between woman and man should exclude one-half of the human race from the advantages of this Divine dispensation. To prove this, is incumbent on those who assert that something of this kind ought to be the case, as it is perfectly in order to assume that the law of equal freedom for all is applicable to both sexes, until the contrary be clearly proved. But without making use of this advantage, we will boldly begin the contest. There are but three cases possible : first, that woman has no rights at all ; second, that her rights are not so great as man's ; third, that woman's rights are equal with man's.

"Those who would defend the first of those propositions, viz., that woman has no rights at all, must prove that the Creator intended woman should be entirely given up to the mercy of man, or, in other words, that they should be treated as creatures of an inferior order. Few surely will have the boldness to assert this.

" Upon considering the second assertion, viz., that woman's rights are not so great as man's, several questions present themselves immediately, as for instance : if they are not so great, thou how much less are they? What is the exact relation between the lawful pretensions of the two sexes ? How shall we be able to tell what rights are common to both, and in what proportion the rights of man exceed those of woman ? Who can show us a scale by which a just distribution can be made ? Or, if we consider the question practically, then we require to have it decided logically, if the Turk acts according to his rights, when he plunges a faithless Circassian lady into the Bosphorus. Were woman's rights violated by the Athenian law, which under certain circumstances allowed a citizen to sell a daughter or sister? Are law decisions morally defensible, which allow a husband to beat his wife with moderation, or shut her up in a room of his house ? Is it fair that married women should not be able to possess property, or that unmarried woman should be considered as minors the whole of their life-time ? Is it according to his rights that a husband can take possession of his wife's earnings against her will ; which the law of England permits him to do so &c. These, and numbers of other problems present themselves to us for solution. We must find a principle, which is founded on the nature of things, by which we can scientifically solve them,—not decided, by reason of their accordance with a certain intention, but in a decided philosophical way. Is there any who defends this doctrine that woman's rights are not so great as man's, who believes he is able to find such a principle ? If not, the alternative only remains to take up the third assertion, that woman's rights are equal with man's. That which has been said about woman's mental inferiority as a hindrance to satisfy her claim of equal rights with man, can be met in different ways. In the first place, the asserted fact can be denied. The defender of woman can name many of that sex who, in aptness for science, for literature, for the fine arts, and for administrating, have obtained not a small degree of celebrity. Talented and wise queens the world has seen many of, from Zenobia down to the Empress Catherine and Maria Theresa. Mrs. Somerville, Miss Herschell, and Miss Zornlin have gained celebrity in the abstract sciences. Miss Martinéau, in political economy; Madame de Staé, in general philosophy; Madame Roland, in politics. The art of poetry has its Tighe's,' Hemans's; Laudon's, Browning's. The drama, its Johanne Bailli; and the novel its Austen's, Bremer's, Gore's, Dudevant's, and innumerable others. In the art of sculpture, a princess has acquired celebrity. Not a few paintings (Mrs. Jerichan Bauman's) give very fair proof of female capability in this direction; and on the stage it is certain that woman holds the same standing as man, if she does not carry off the prize there. When to those facts we add the important consideration that woman has always been and still is disadvantageously placed with regard to every one of the above named departments. When we see that she cannot get admittance to academies and universities in which men receive their development. That the prospects which lie before her do not present a wide field for ambition. That she is more seldom exposed to the most powerful of all motives—necessity ; that the education which habit and custom prescribe, leave many of the higher faculties uncultivated ; and that the prevailing prejudices against learned ladies have highly contributed to prevent woman from acquiring literary honours. If we add these reflections to the above-named facts, we have good ground to assume that the pretended female inferiority with regard to mental capabilities is in no wise evident.
" But giving up this advantage, we will combat the assertion on its own supposition.
" Let it be acknowledged that woman's understanding is less penetrating than man's ; that she more generally is guided by feelings more susceptible of impressions, and less reflecting than man. Let all this be yielded, and let us then see what foundation we, by, such a concession, give to the assertion that woman's rights are not so great as man's.
" If rights are to be measured out to the two sexes in proportion to their corresponding degree of understanding, then the same system must be acted on by the distribution of rights between man and woman. In the same way it follows that as there have been, as there yet are, women of indisputably greater ability than the generality of men, some women ought to have greater rights than some men. Therefore, instead of fixing conditions for the rights of all men, and others for the rights of all women, the proposition itself contains a gradation of rights altogether, without regard to sex, and gives us thereby again the commission to seek this desired but unattainable principle, by which we can measure mental capability, together with another by which we can measure the corresponding rights.

" However, this theory breaks down by merely examining it; it is absurd from every point of view, as soon as it is stripped of the disguise of borrowed phrases; for what is that which we understand by rights ? Nothing else but liberty to apply capabilities; and what is the meaning of the assertion; that woman is mentally inferior to man ? Simply this, that her capabilities are less considerable. Where, therefore, does the assertion lead to, that because woman is mentally inferior to man, she has no extensive rights ? Why to this, that because woman has got weaker capabilities than man, she ought not to have the same liberty as man has to develope the capabilities she does possess. Man's opinions bear always the impression of his character, and is in reality the product of it. Examine a person's opinion of certain things, and you will find it founded on facts, which are collected under the inspiration of his wishes. His strong passions consume all the proofs which oppose themselves to his wishes, and, on the contrary, infusing all those which serve his purpose, he shapes them into a weapon by which he attains the end. There is no act so blameworthy, that the perpetrator of it does not make to himself some excuse which justifies it, and if the act is often repeated, such an excuse becomes an article of faith. The basest acts that have been perpetrated. The St. Bartholomew massacre and such like have had their defenders, yea, even have been recorded as the accomplishment of the Divine will. There is wisdom in the fable which represents the wolf raising accusations against the lamb before he devours it. It is always so with man. No conqueror ever raised the standard without being convinced that he had a just cause to fight for. Sacrifices and prayers have preceded every military enterprise, from Ceasar's campaigns to a simple border invasion. God is on our side, is the universal cry. Two warring nations consecrate each for themselves their standards, and that one of them who gains the victory, sings a Te Deum. Attila assumed that he had a Divine pretension to rule the earth. The Spaniards subjected the Indians under pretence of converting them to Christianity, and hung thirteen of those who opposed them to the honour of Jesus Christ and his Apostles!

" We English justify our colonist agressions by saying, it is the intention of the Creator that the Anglo Saxon race shall people the world ! An insatiable desire for conquest transforms assassination into a virtue, and in more than one nation an insatiable desire for vengeance has made murder a duty. To be an able thief was praiseworthy among the Spartans, and is so also among Christians, provided it is done on a sufficient large scale ; piracy was heroism in Jason and his followers ; it was the same among the Normans, and till this day among the Malays, a golden fleece for pretence is never wanted. In a nation that hunts after money, a man is praised in proportion to the number of hours he applies himself to business; in our days the rage to accumulate money has increased the work to a high degree, and even the miser does not want a moral code by which he defends his avarice. The governing classes argue themselves into the belief that property ought to be represented in preference to persons, that the possession of acres gives man a preponderating importance ; and, on the other side, the poor are perfectly convinced that they have a right to support. The monks considered printing a discovery of the devil's, and some of our modern sects consider their opposing brethren to be in the power of the devil. Nothing is dearer to the clergy than that a State Church is just and of importance to the preservation of religion. He who has got a sinecure considers every attack on it as an injustice ; so it is through the whole of society.

" Perhaps the assertion of the slave-owners that the negroes are not human beings, and the Mahommedan doctrine, which is allied to it, that woman has no soul, are the most singular instances of convictions formed in this way. In this, as in the other cases, selfishness finds a sufficient reason for doing that which it has a mind to do. It concludes and perverts, exaggerates and suppresses, in such a way that it attains at last to the desired conclusion by self-deception. Does any one doubt that man really can believe in things that are palpable contradictions to the simplest facts? Is there any one who will assert that those who pronounce evidently absurd opinions must be hypocrites? Let him beware. Let him consider whether selfishness has not sometimes reduced him into absurdities that are nearly as great. The law of England and public opinion in England, support doctrines that are almost as foolish as those that appear so incomprehensible to us, yea, even, the self-same position, only somewhat modified for, what is, when we closely examine it, the meaning of this, that women's rights are not so great as man's ? Only a hidden form for the theory that woman has no soul.

"That the condition of a people can be judged by the treatment its women enjoy is a remark which almost has become stale. The facts from which this remark is taken are to be found in profusion. Let us look where ever we list, and we find that, forasmuch as the law of the strong rules the relation between man and man, so also it rules the relation between man and woman. To the same extent that power governs courts of justice is the political institutions of a nation, it governs also in its domestic circles. Despotism in the state is necessarily coupled with despotism in the household, and immorality is the origin and attendant of both. Turkey, Egypt, India, China, Russia; we need only name these countries to produce numbers of facts, which prove such an agreement. Yet, strange to say, almost every one who makes this remark overlooks its applicability to himself. Here we sit at our table, and pronounce judgment over the national character of other nations, or make philosophical remarks on the development of uncivilized nations, while we take it for granted that we are civilized, that the state of things under which we live is the right one, or about that. Though people have thought the same in all former generations, and all have been mistaken, there are yet many in whose thoughts it never seems to enter that we also could make mistakes. In their anger at the bad treatment of women in the East, and the objectionable social rights unto which it lends, most men do not perceive that exactly the same confection between political and domestic oppression is in existence at if is present time in our England ; and that for as much as our laws and customs violate the precepts of humanity by giving the richer classes power over the poorer ones, so likewise are those rights violated by giving the stronger sex power over the weaker. Yet, if we look upon the case without prejudice, and consider the institutions for what they are—the productions of the character of the people—we cannot fail to confess that such must be the case. To the same extent as the old remnant of tyranny shows itself in the debates of the Councils, will it likewise show itself in the households.

" If unjust considerations rule men's public acts, they will unavoidably also guide their private acts. The mere fact that oppression marks the relations of public life, is a valid proof that it exists in the domestic circles.

" The wish to command is par excellence a barbarous wish. Whether it be seen in the Ukase of a Czar, or in the commands of an Eton bully to his slave, it is equally indicative of rudeness—its command cannot be otherwise than rude," for it contains an appeal to power if power should be necessary. Behind—thou shalt lies badly hidden if you will not,I will make you. Command is the growling of force, when it lies in ambush. Perhaps we might rather call it assault in a somewhat hidden form. Everything that accompanies it, the drawn eyebrows, the roughness of the voice, the gestures, show that it is allied with the ferocity of uncivilized man. Command is the enemy of peace, for it produces war in words and feelings, sometimes in actions. It is incompatible with the first law in morals, it is fundamentally wrong.
" All the barbarisms, of the past ages have their types in the present age. It must be so, for all the earlier barbarisms have come into existence by certain dispositions ; these dispositions may be weaker at this present time, but they are not extinct, and as long as they do exist they must manifest themselves. That which we in general understand by command, and obedience, are the new forms for the despotism and slavery of former days. Philosophically considered they are identical with them. Despotism can be defined as the desire to got another's will bent to the satisfying of our own. It is true we apply those appellations only then, when one person's dominion over another goes to extremes, when one person destroys the will of another entirely or nearly entirely. But if man's subjection to man is bad when carried out to its fullest extent, then it is bad in every degree. If every person liberty to apply his faculties within, certain limits, and if slavery be wrong, because it transgresses this liberty, and makes a man apply his powers not to the satisfying of his own necessities, but to the pretensions of another, then whatsoever contains a despotic command, or whatsoever brings with it subjection, is wrong also ; since it thereby always becomes necessary that one person's notions be executed not with truth and justice in view, but the satisfying of another person. ' You must not do as you will, but as I will,' is the foundation for every command, whether it be used by a planter to his negro, or by a husband to his wife. Not satisfied with being the sovereign over his own actions, the little despot oversteps the bounds which separates his own dominions from his neighbours, and takes upon himself also to direct his or her actions. With regard to the principle it is indifferent whether such a dominion be partial or perfect. To whatever extent one person's will is overcome by another person's will, to the same extent also have both parties become tyrant and slave. There are, no doubt, many who will object to this position ; there are many whoso opinion it is that the obedience of one human being to another is proper, virtuous, and praiseworthy. There are many to whose moral sense command is not disgusting. There are many who consider the objection of the weaker sex to the stronger as lawful and beneficial. Let them not deceive themselves; let them remember that the laws, institutions, and opinions of a people are decided by its character. Let them remember that man's notions are guided by his passions. Let them remember that our social condition shows that our higher feelings are but very imperfectly developed ; and let them remember that, as many of the customs which our ancestors looked upon as good, appear abominable to us, so many customs which we consider as proper, will be looked upon with aversion by our more civilized posterity. Exactly as we abhor the barbarous custom which forbids a wife to sit at table with her lord and husband, so in future times will humanity abhor the subjection of wife to husband, which our present laws indicate. The moral sense becomes only a faithful guide when it has logic as interpretor. It lays the foundation of a doctrine, but reason derives all the consequences from it, and if they are deducted with precision, the judgment is without appeal. It proves, therefore, nothing that there are some who do not feel that command is improper. It behoves such to ask if command is in accordance with the first principle, which expresses the Divine will—the principle which answers to the moral sense ; and they will find that command, judged by the law of equal liberty, is immediately condemned; for he who commands demands evidently more liberty than he who is commanded.

"The faith of a future time in the unfairness of one sex's subjection to the other is evident; it is prophesied in the change, which civilization effects in men's feelings. The arbitrary dominion of one human being over another begins now to be acknowledged us essentially rude and brutal. A man with delicacy of feelings does not like, in our days, to stand as lord over against his equal, He does not wish that people in depressed circumstances should cringe to him. So far from wishing to depress his poorer and more ignorant neighbours, be endeavours to make them easy in his presence—encourages them to behave less humbly, to have more respect for themselves. He feels that man can quite as well be made a slave by lordly phrases and manners, as by tyrannical acts, and, therefore, he avoids using such phrases to his inferiors. Even paid servants, to whose services he has acquired a right by contract, he does not like to address in an imperious tone. He attempts rather to hide his lordly appearance, and gives, therefore, his orders in the form of desires, and uses continually such sentences as, 'If you please,' and 'I thank you." In the conduct of such a man towards his friend we have another sign of the growing esteem for another person's dignity. Every one must have remarked the care with which those who stand on an intimate footing avoid every sort of dominion on either side, and endeavour by their conduct towards each other to remove the impression that superiority does exist. Is there, any who has not been witness of the dilemma in which the richer one of such two friends is put, when the wish to serve the other, and the fear that by doing so he might take the appearance of patronising, stand in opposition to each other. A further extension of this delicacy will show men that there is an unlucky disagreement between the matrimonial slavery, which our laws acknowledge, and the relation that ought to exist between husband and wife. In truth, if he who possesses a generous disposition does not like to speak in a lordly tone to a hired servant—if he cannot endure to adopt the bearing of a superior towards a friend—how utterly disgusting then must it be for him to make himself a ruler over her for whose welfare all his kindliest feelings ought to be particularly engaged. Her to whom he is united by the strongest attachment which his nature is capable of entertaining, and for whose rights and dignity he ought to have the warmest sympathy.

" Command is a wet blanket on love. That which is purity, that which is beauty, that which is poetry in the passion which unites the sexes, withers and dies in the cold atmosphere of authority. Love and force cannot possibly thrive together ; the one grows out of our best feelings, the other has its roots in our worst." Love is sympathising, force is rigid; love is gentle, force is unyielding ; love is self-sacrificing, force is selfish. How can they dwell together? The quality of the one is to attract, while that of the ether is to repulse; and therefore, where they meet, a steady endeavour is developed in the one to destroy the other.

" Let any one who considers the two feelings as compatible, imagine to himself that he is now entirely master over his bride, Does he think he can do this without any prejudice to the existing relation of love? Does he not rather know with certainty that a disadvantageous effect would appear in the feelings of both parties by the taking up of such a position? And if he admits this, as he must, is be weak enough to believe that dominion, hid in a form of words, will make the use of command harmless, which otherwise would be hurtful? Of all the causes which conspire to produce disappointment in the brilliant hopes with which people generally enter into matrimonial life, none is so powerful as this preponderance of the husband,—this degradation of what should have been a free and equal relation into becoming a rotation between ruler and subject—this expulsion of the rule of love for the rule of authority. Gradually only as the slavish position to which woman is condemned among barbarous nations becomes amended will ideal love become possible, and only when this slavish position shall become completely annihilated will ideal love attain to perfection and continuance. The facts round us show this clearly. Wherever there is anything that is worthy to be called matrimonial happiness we will find that the subjection of the wife to the husband is not forced ; though yet, perhaps, maintained in theory, it is practically rejected.

" There are many who assume that authority and the therewith allied force are the only means by which human beings can be kept in order. Anarchy or despotism is for them the only alternatives. Believing only that which they can see, they cannot imagine the possibility of a state of things in which peace and order can be retained without force or the fear of force. The position that man's dominion over woman is wrong will doubtless be disputed by such people for this reason, that the domestic relations can only exist by the help of this preponderance. The impracticability of equality of rights between the sexes will by them cited as a refutation of its correctness. It would argued that, if the sexes were put on an equal footing, husband and wife would always be quarrelling —since each of them, whenever their wishes came in collision, would possess an equal claim to have his or her will ; the matrimonial connection would daily be exposed to injury by opposing wishes, and that, as this would bring along with it a continual contest, such an arrangement of the matrimonial union would necessarily be wrong. This is a very superficial conclusion. We all know that there must be a disagreement between the perfect law and the imperfect state. The worse the state of society is, the more imaginary must a true code of morality appear. The fact that the rule which we would adopt for our conduct is not perfectly practicable—that an improvement of human nature is needed for its carrying out—is not a proof in favour of the opposite position, but shows rather that what does exist has originated in an improper state of things. And on the contrary, a certain degree of disagreement between such a principle and humanity as we know it, is, though not a proof of the correctness of the principle which we would establish, at all events a fact in favour of it. The assertion, therefore, that the human race is not good enough to allow the two sexes to live together in concord under the law of equal liberty, does in no wise disagree with the validity and sacredness of this law. But time with its ever progressing changes will by degrees take away this hindrance to domestic happiness. When the perception of the moral law and the desire to act in accordance with it goes hand-in-hand then equality of rights in matrimony will become possible as soon as the recognition of its justice has arisen. This selfish contest about rights, which according to the previous objection would lead a union which was founded on the law of equal liberty, to a condition of anarchy, pre-supposes a want of those feelings by which faith in the law of equal liberty has arisen, and would be diminished by the increase of those feelings. The same feeling which induces us to cling to our own rights, induces us by its sympathetic condition to esteem the rights of our neighbours. As in other things the feeling of justice to ourselves, and the feeling of justice to our neighbours, stand always in proportion to each other. A state in which every one is jealous of his natural rights is therefore not a quarrelsome state, in it there is necessarily less inclination to attack. Experience proves this. For, as it cannot be denied, that there is now a greater inclination in man to defend the liberty of the individual, than there was in the middle ages, so can it likewise not be denied, that there is now less inclination in mankind to ill-treat each other than was apparent at that time. The two changes are co-existing and must continue to be so. Therefore, when once society becomes civilized enough to acknowledge equality of rights for the two sexes; when woman first attains a distinct comprehension of that which is due to her, and man's nobility of feeling, which will allow him to accord to woman the liberty she herself demands, then the human race will have undergone such a change that equality in these rights will also be made possible.

"Under this last mentioned state of things continual quarrels will not mark matrimonial life, but mutual concessions. Instead of the husband endeavouring to exact his demands to the utmost, without regard to his wife's wishes, or the wife to do the same, there will be a watchful desire on both sides not to oppose each other. It will not be necessary for either of them to keep "en garde," for each will be careful about the rights of the other. The contest will no longer be, who shall have dominion, but who shall give way. Not to gain the mastery, but self-sacrificing will be the ruling principle. To do wrong will be more feared than to be wronged. And so, instead of domestic discord, there will be a higher sort of concord than any we have yet known.

" There is nothing Utopian in this. We can already perceive its commencement. A relation such as that described is not uncommon among honourable men in their relations to each other, and if so, why should it not exist between the two sexes ? Here and there may be found even in our days a couple who maintain such a relation; and what is now the exception may become the rule.

" It will, doubtless, be objected against this extension of the law of equal liberty,that political privileges are exercised by man, and by this rule,they must also be given to woman. Of course they must, and why not? Is it now the case that women are ignorant of politics? If so, their opinions will be directed by those of their husbands and brothers, and the practical effect will be to give every male elector two votes instead of one. On the contrary, are the circumstances such that they by degrees could become better instructed ? Well, in that case, they will be as competent to use their power with understanding as our present electors. It is now told us, "that housewifery is the destination of woman, that her character and position do not allow her to take a part in the decisions of public questions, that politics are above her sphere." But then the question arises—Who shall say what is her sphere? To some nations it is that of a pack-horse ; she shall carry the burden, draw the wood home from the bush, and do everything that is mean and laborious. In the slave countries, it is within the sphere of woman to work side by side with man under the lash of the overseer. Clerkships, cashierships, and other responsible situations are within her sphere in modern France; while, on the other hand, the sphere of an Egyptian or Turkish lady extends itself scarcely an inch outside of the walls of the harem. Who shall now say what woman's sphere really is? "As the habits of the human race vary so much, how is it to be shown that the sphere we assign to her is the one ; that the boundaries we have set to the female sphere of action are exactly the true ones. Let us then hear, why we are exactly in the right in this one point of our social politics, while we make mistakes in so many other points of it. It is certainly said that it is at variance with our feeling for the becoming that woman should exercise political power—that it is contrary to our ideas of the female character—that it is quite condemned by our feelings. Granted, but what then ? The same evasion has been used as a defence for a thousand absurdities, and if it be valid in one case, it is so in all others. Should a traveller in the East ask a Turk, why the women in his country hide their faces, it would be told him that it would not be considered decent for them to go unveiled, that it would hurt the feelings of the spectators. In Russia female voices are never heard in church, as woman is not considered worthy to sing to the honour of God in the presence of men, and contempt for this rule would be deemed an offence against the feelings of the public. There was a time in France that, when a lady pronounced correctly any but the simplest words, her nearest relatives blushed for her, a good proof what the feelings of a people mean ; then a lady was blamed for the knowledge of language, which now would be considered a shame for her to be without. In China, compressed feet are essential to female delicacy, and so strong is the feeling in this matter that a Chinaman will not believe that an Englishwoman whose feet have grown to the natural size belongs in the higher classes. It was once considered unfeminine for a lady to write a book, and doubtless they who thought so would lave cited "the feelings" to support their opinion. And yet with facts like those before them, people assume that the liberation of woman cannot be right, because it is contrary to their feelings. We have some feelings which are necessary and durable, we have others, which as they are the result of habit, are changeable and evanescent. And there are no means by which we can separate the feelings which are natural, from those which are adopted, but by an appeal to the first moral principles. If a feeling answers to some one or other necessity in our position, then its demand must be respected, if it be otherwise if it be at variance with a necessity instead of being in harmony with it, thou we must consider this feeling as produced by circumstances, by education, by habit, and it follows that it is without weight. Therefore, however little it agrees with our ideas of the becoming to give political power to woman, we must yet conclude that as it is required by the first beginning to the greatest happiness—by the law of equal liberty—the giving up of this feeling is undoubtedly right and good.

" In this manner it has been shown that woman's rights must stand or fall with man's as they are derived front the same authority, contained in the same principle, proved by the same argument. That the law of equal liberty is equally applicable to both sexes has farther been proved by the fact that every other hypothesis envelops us in endless difficulties. The thought that woman's rights are not equal with man's has been condemned as allied with the Eastern doctrine that woman has no soul. It has been proved that the position which the weaker sex now occupies is necessarily wrong when we see that the same selfishness which injures our political institutions must inevitably also injure our domestic ones. Woman's subjection to man has likewise been protested against as it brings with it the use of command, and thereby betrays its barbarian origin. Proof has been tendered that dominion on the one side, and subjection on the other side, is essentially at variance with the feeling that ought to exist between husband and wife. The argument that matrimonial life would be impracticable under every other arrangement, has been met by pointing out how the position of equality will become possible as soon as its justice is acknowledged; and, lastly, it has been shown that objections which generally are raised against giving political power to woman are founded on opinions and prejudices which cannot bear examination."

 Empire 6 February 1857,  http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article60276717