X. But passing from the moral to the physical, which is more applicable to our present purpose, we shall find the preference of the robust over the delicate sex is a point settled, and any claim or pretensions to equality on the part of the women is set aside, and treated with contempt; and to such a length has depreciating the women been carried by some, that they have not scrupled to call them imperfect, and even monstrous animals, asserting, that Nature, in the work of generation, never intended to produce any thing but males, and that it was only by mistake, or in consequence of some defect in the matter or faculty, that females were produced. XI. O admirable adepts in physics! It would follow from hence, that Nature conspired to work its own destruction, because, without the concurrence of both sexes, the species cannot be preserved. It would follow also, that Nature in this her principal work, is more frequently mistaken than right; because it is allowed, that she produces more women than men. Nor when we see females the offspring of parents who are healthy, robust, and in the flower of their age, can we attribute the formation of them to debility, want of vigour, or a defect in the matter; nor is it probable, that if man had preserved his original innocence, in which case there would have been none of these defects, we should have had no women born, and that the human lineage would have been kept up or continued without propagation. XII. I know very well there was an author, who, for the sake of indulging his malice, and supporting his envious insinuations against the other sex, swallowed so palpable an absurdity. This was Almaricus, a Parisian doctor of the twelfth century, who, among other errors, asserts, that, if the state of innocence had continued, all the individuals of our species would have been males, and that God would have created them immediately himself as he did Adam. XIII. Almaricus was a blind follower of Aristotle, insomuch that all, or very near all his errors, were produced by conclusions, which he had drawn from the doctrines of that philosopher; and, seeing that Aristotle, in more than one part of his works, gives it to be understood, that a female is a defective animal, its generation accidental, and out of the design of nature, he concluded, that there were no women in the state of innocence; and thus it comes to pass, that an heretical theology is very frequently occasioned by a mistake in physics. XIV. But the great and avowed adherence of Almaricus to Aristotle, was rather unfortunate to them both; because the errors of Almaricus were condemned by a council held at Paris in 1209; and, in the same council, the reading the books of Aristotle were prohibited, which prohibition was afterwards confirmed by Pope Gregory IX. Almaricus had been dead a year when his dogmas were proscribed; but his bones were afterwards dug up, and thrown into a jake.