The rights of the husband regarding his wife, I have said, are usually considered total and indisputable. Till now they have seldom been challenged; certainly seldom of men by a man. In listening, as I have done, to the plaints of women, I have neither eavesdropped nor suggested. In presenting them now after these years of comparison and cross-examination, it is with no quixotic feeling of championship, but solely with the desire of an earnest physician to assuage physical and mental pains, very real though often uncomplained of and unappreciated, to carry comfort to hearts disappointed and well nigh broken, to check abuses whose authors may not have recognized them as such, and to evoke a higher manliness than is our usual wont, as men, to exhibit. What, then, do we usually claim? All that the law, and still more tyrannical custom, grants to us, in our wives; all that they have, and all that they are, in person and in very life. And here let me say, that I intend taking no ultra ground; that I am neither a fanatic nor professed philanthrope; and that in loosing, as I hope to do, some of woman’s present chains, it is solely for professional purposes, to increase her health, prolong her life, extend the benefits she confers upon society—in a word, selfishly to enhance her value to ourselves; and yet there is somewhat in this effort, as I believe there is also in the hearts of all those who will peruse it, of gratitude to her for the love with which she has solaced us, as mother, and sister, and wife, and daughter,—all of which I have myself possessed; unhappy he who has not. Give to her, then, the serious consideration due from every man “born of woman’s agony,” the depth and measure of which but few of us ever really know. I am no advocate for unwomanly women; I would not transplant them, from their proper and God-given sphere, to the pulpit, the forum, or the cares of state, nor would I repeat the experiment, so patiently tried by myself, and at last so emphatically condemned[32]—of females attempting the practice of the medical profession. I would undoubtedly open to single women every legitimate avenue to an honorable self-support, and thus keep them from many of the pitfalls which so closely environ them, and by causing for the married woman more or greater occasion to respect her husband, I would redouble for him her affection. These are some of my claims to be heard, and they are weighty ones in truth.