I add, lastly, that I feel myself linked with my sex by too close a solidarity ever to be content to see myself abstracted from it by an illogical process. I am a woman--I glory in it; I rejoice if any value is set upon me, not for myself, indeed, but because this contributes to modify the opinion of men with respect to my sex. A woman who is happy in hearing it said: "_You are a man_," is, in my eyes, a simpleton, an unworthy creature, avowing the superiority of the masculine sex; and the men who think that they compliment her in this manner, are vainglorious and impertinent boasters. If I acquire any desert, I thus pay honor to women, I reveal their aptitudes, I do not pass into the other sex any more than Proudhon abandons his own, because he is elevated by his intellect above the level of foolish and ignorant men; and if the ignorance of the mass of men prejudges nothing against their right, no more does the ignorance of the mass of women prejudge anything against theirs. You affirm that man and woman do not form _true society_. Tell us, then, what is marriage, what is society. You affirm that the difference of sex places between man and woman a separation of the same nature _as that which the difference of races places between animals_. Then prove: That the race is not essentially formed of two sexes; That man and woman can be reproduced separately; That their common product is a mixed breed, or a mule; That their characteristics are dissimilar, apart from sexuality. And if you come off with honor from this great feat of strength, you will still have to prove: That to difference of race corresponds difference _of right_; That the black, the yellow, the copper-colored persons belonging to races inferior to the Caucasian cannot truly associate with the latter; that they are minors. Come, sir, study anthropology, physiology, and phrenology, and employ your serial dialectics to prove all this to us. You are inclined to seclude woman, instead of emancipating her? Prove to men that they have the right to do so; to women, that it is their duty to suffer themselves to be placed under lock and key. I declare, for my part, that I would not submit to it. Does Proudhon remember how he threatens the priest who shall lay his hand on his children? Well, the majority of women would not confine themselves to threats against those who might have the Mussulmanic inclination of Proudhon. You affirm that by _nature_, and by _destination_, woman is neither _associate_, nor _citizen_, nor _functionary_. Tell us, in the first place, _what nature_ it is necessary to have to be all these. Reveal to us the _nature_ of woman, since you claim to know it better than she does herself. Reveal to us her _destination_, which apparently is not that which we see, nor which she believes to be such.