OBJECTIONS TO THE EMANCIPATION OF WOMEN. I. What arguments do the adversaries of the emancipation of women use to refute the equality of the rights of the sexes? Some, theosophists of the old school, claim that one half of humanity is condemned by God himself to submit to the other half, because, they say, the first woman sinned. Not wishing to depart from the firm ground of justice, reason and proved facts, we will not argue with this class of adversaries. Others, who claim to be imbued with the modern spirit, and pretend to be disciples of the doctrines of liberty, condemn woman to inferiority and obedience because, they say, she is weaker physically and intellectually than man; Because she performs functions of an inferior order; Because she produces less than man in an industrial point of view; Because her peculiar temperament prevents her from performing certain functions; Because she is only fit for in-door life; because her vocation is to be mother and housewife, to devote herself entirely to her husband and children; Because man protects and supports her; Because man is her proxy, and exercises rights both for her and himself; Because woman has no more time than capacity to exercise certain rights. The rights of woman are in her beauty and our love, add some, gallantly. Woman does not claim her rights; many women themselves are scandalized by the demands made by a few of their sex, continue other men. And they spare the courageous women who plead the cause of right, and the men who sustain them neither calumnies, nor mockery, nor insult, hoping to intimidate the former and disgust the latter. Vain hope! the time in which we could be intimidated has gone by. If it is justifiable to fear the opinion of those whom we deem juster and more intelligent than ourselves, it would be folly to be disturbed by those whose irrationality and injustice we feel able to demonstrate. This double demonstration we are about to attempt, taking up one by one the arguments of these gentlemen. 1. Woman cannot have the same rights as man, because she is inferior to him in intellectual faculties, you say. From this proposition, we have a right to conclude that you consider the _human faculties as the basis of right_; That, the law proclaiming equality of right for your sex, you are all equal in qualities, all alike strong and alike intelligent. That, lastly, no woman is as strong and as intelligent as you; I cannot say, as the least among you, since, if right is founded on qualities, as it is equal, your qualities must be equal. Now gentlemen, what becomes of these pretensions in the presence of _facts_ that show you all unequal in strength and in intellect? What becomes of these pretensions in the presence of _facts_ that show us a host of women stronger than many men; a host of women more intelligent than the great mass of men?