The equality of rights established between men by our new constitution has brought down upon us eloquent declamations and never-ending pleasantries; but up till now no one has been able to oppose to it one single reason, and this is certainly neither from lack of talent nor lack of zeal. I venture to believe that it will be the same with regard to equality of rights between the two sexes. It is sufficiently curious that, in a great number of countries, women have been judged incapable of all public functions yet worthy of royalty; that in France a woman has been able to be regent, and yet that up to 1776 she could not be a milliner or dressmaker (“marchande des modes”) in Paris, except under cover of her husband’s name;[2] and that, lastly, in our elective assemblies they have accorded to rights of property what they have refused to natural right. Many of our noble deputies owe to ladies the honour of sitting among the representatives of the nation. Why, instead of depriving of this right women who were owners of landed estates, was it not extended to all those who possessed property or were heads of households? Why, if it be found absurd to exercise the right of citizenship by proxy, deprive women of this right, rather than leave them the liberty of exercising it in person? [2] Before the suppression of “jurandes,” in 1776, women could neither carry on a business of a “marchande des modes” (milliner and dressmaker) nor of any other profession exercised by them, unless they were married, or unless some man lent or sold them his name for that purpose.--_See_ preamble of the Edict of 1776. REMARKS. Although I am not aware of any previous translation of the foregoing essay, and do not remember to have seen anywhere any allusion to this first publication on the subject of woman’s emancipation, yet I have been struck by the close similarity of the arguments used by J. S. Mill and by those who have succeeded him in the advocacy of women’s electoral freedom to those used by the Marquis de Condorcet in this essay. It could not, indeed, well be otherwise, since the fundamental principle of equal rights, and equal claim to protection in the exercise of these rights, must present itself in the same forcible light to any really intelligent person who is truly anxious to lay down just and fair principles of government. That it should be within the reach of every individual of the human race to attain to the power of influencing the Government under which he or she lives, follows inevitably to logical minds, and the only exceptions which can fairly be made are those of the immature and the failures. The immature, indeed, can scarcely be called exceptions, since maturity succeeds immaturity--the child becomes the adult; and as physical, moral, and intellectual powers are acquired, civil rights must be accorded.