The saving of but one Soul from Destruction, is, it is true, a noble recompense for ten Thousand such Censurers as these; but it is wondrous strange that only to be a Christian, with so much other Knowledge as a Child of Nine or Ten Years Old may, and ought to have, should expose a Lady to so great Reproaches; And what a shame is this for Men whose woful Ignorance is the alone Cause thereof? For it is manifestly true that if the inimitable Author of _Les Caracteres, ou les Moeurs de ce Siecle_, had demanded in _England, who forbids Knowledge to Women_? It must have been answer'd him, the Ignorance of the Men does so; and the same Answer I think he might have receiv'd in his own Country. _Monsieur Bruyere_ says indeed, and likely it is, _That Men have made no Laws, or put out any Edicts whereby Women are prohibited to open their Eyes; to Read; to Remember what they Read, and to make use thereof in their Conversation, or in composing of Works_. But surely he had little Reason to suppose, as he herein does, that Women could not otherwise than _by Laws and Edicts_ be restrain'd from Learning. It is sufficient for this that no body assists them in it; and that they are made to see betimes that it would be disadvantageous to them to have it. For how few Men are there, that arrive to any Eminence therein? tho' Learning is not only not prohibited to them _by Laws and Edicts;_ but that ordinarily much Care, and Pains, is taken to give it them; and that great Profits, oftentimes, and, always, Honour attends their having it. The Law of Fashion, establish'd by Repute and Disrepute, is to most People the powerfullest of all Laws, as Monsieur _Bruyere_ very well knew; whose too Satyrical Genius makes him assign as Causes of Womens not having Knowledge, the universally necessary consequences of being bred in the want thereof. But what on different occasions he says of the Sex, will either on the one part vindicate them, or else serve for an Instance that this Ingenious Writers Reflections, however witty, are not always instructive, or just Corrections. For either Women have generally some other more powerful Principle of their Actions than what terminates in rendering themselves pleasing to Men (as he insinuates they have not) or else they neglect the improvement of their Minds and Understandings, as not finding them of any use to that purpose; whence it is not equal in him to charge it peculiarly (as he does) upon that Sex (if it be indeed so much chargeable on them as on Men) that they are diverted from Science by _une curiosité toute differente de celle qui contente l'Espirt: ou un tout autre gout que celuy d'exercer leur Memoire_. Yet since I think it is but Natural, and alike so in both Sexes, to desire to please the other, I may, I suppose, without any Injurious Reflexion upon Ladies, presume, that if Men did usually find Women the more amiable for being knowing, they would much more commonly, than now they are, be so.