Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 1.djvu/99

Rh human beings who are actually born into the world could in reality, or even in imagination, be made to conform to this sexless archetype, there could be no objection to voters on the score of sex. Thus much may be safely admitted; but it would then be in the power of any human being to coin such a word as "mammality," or "animality," or to make use of the old word "entity," to assert the existence of a substance corresponding to each word, and so to destroy not only the distinction between man and brute, but between organic and inorganic matter. In short, the very same argument which would introduce woman to man's occupations on the ground of her humanity, would introduce whales on the ground of their mammality, or stocks and stones on the ground of their entity.

I trust that I shall not be considered guilty of any disrespect in reducing some well known arguments of some justly influential thinkers ad absurdum. I no more mean to show disrespect by my treatment of the subject, than to deny the sincere philanthropy of many who advocate woman's rights, when I say that it savors not a little of priestcraft. Just as the metaphysical stage of thought bears a great resemblance to the religious, so the attempt to carry a philosophical doctrine into execution is by no means unlike the attempt to impose a creed. Every ideal form of government which has hitherto been conceived has had innumerable elements in common with the Church of the middle ages. From the time of Plato to our own, philosophers have always presented themselves upon the domestic hearth to dictate the relations between husband and wife; all who are acquainted with the early books of penance will remember that the priest took upon himself the same office, even to the minutest details. In all the mediæval works which touch upon science it will be found that the final authority upon every controverted point is not the evidence which may be discovered, but the doctrine of the Church; so neither Plato nor Malthus, nor the followers of either, appeal fairly to physiological facts or laws, but would repress the very instincts of human nature wherever they are opposed to the philosophical idea.

The apostles of all religious and all metaphysical doctrines have commonly been not only energetic but thoroughly honest men. They would direct all thought and all action into the groove worn by their own minds, not from an innate love of tyranny, but from an enthusiasm which cannot admit the possibility that persons of a different opinion may be in the right. In the apostle there is always much to admire, but it happens only too often that his priestly successor inherits his faults without his virtues. The present may be called the apostolic age of the doctrine of equal humanity; and many followers will be won through respect for the character of the apostles, rather than from conviction after sober consideration. But, to the student who desires something positive in science, and who would use that science for the benefit of mankind, there is sad discouragement in the spectacle of a