Page:Letters to a friend on votes for women.djvu/34

 sister? In all probability feminine opinion was as much divided as the opinion of men. Still, it is certainly an evil, as to the magnitude of which judgments may differ, that women possess no constitutional means of expressing officially, so to speak, their opinion on subjects with which they are specially concerned.

This whole line of reasoning is open to at least two criticisms. In the first place, the cases in which the interest of women, as a class, even appears to come into conflict with the interest of men, as a class, are rare. Difference of sex, just because it is a natural division, not depending upon external circumstances, such as the difference between rich and poor, landlords and tenants, traders and agriculturists, does not—at any rate in a civilized country like England—often give rise to an opposition of interests. This is the important truth contained in the paradox attributed to John Bright—that 'women are not a class.' Where will you find a body of Englishmen who have legislated of set purpose against the interest of their daughters and in favour of their sons? Primogeniture itself, as a rule governing descent of land,