A Vindication of the Rights of Woman

by Mary Wollstonecraft

like the flowers that are planted in too rich a soil, strength and usefulness are sacrificed to beauty;

I shall not waste my time in rounding periods, nor in fabricating the turgid bombast of artificial feelings, which, coming from the head, never reach the heart.

The man who had some virtue whilst he was struggling for a crown, often becomes a voluptuous tyrant when it graces his brow;

Perhaps, if the existence of an evil being was allowed, who, in the allegorical language of scripture, went about seeking whom he should devour, he could not more effectually degrade the human character than by giving a man absolute power.

A man, when he undertakes a journey, has, in general the end in view; a woman thinks more of the incidental occurrences, the strange things that may possibly occur on the road;

In short, women, in general, as well as the rich of both sexes, have acquired all the follies and vices of civilization, and missed the useful fruit.

“Errors are often useful; but it is commonly to remedy other errors.”

Leibniz

Modesty, temperance, and self-denial, are the sober offspring of reason;

“They who pass their whole lives in working for their daily bread, have no ideas beyond their business or their interest, and all their understanding seems to lie in their fingers’ ends.

The generality of people cannot see or feel poetically, they want fancy, and therefore fly from solitude in search of sensible objects;

Pope’s summary of their character to be just, “that every woman is at heart a rake,”

Few, I believe, have had much affection for mankind, who did not first love their parents, their brothers, sisters, and even the domestic brutes, whom they first played with.

Virtue flies from a house divided against itself—and a whole legion of devils take up their residence there.