Page:The Woman Socialist - Snowden - 1907.djvu/45



“ feeling which makes husband and wife true companions … can grow up only in societies where the altruistic sentiment is so strong in the man as to make him recognise woman as his equal, and where she is not shut up as an exotic plant in a greenhouse, but is allowed to associate freely with men.” So says Westermarck in his “History of Human Marriage.” But the free woman of ancient Greece, beautiful, cultured Greece, knew nothing of this fine relationship. The Greek married women were shut up in their husbands’ houses, where they were visited by their intimate friends. Their seclusion was almost oriental. They appear to have been denied the opportunities of higher education, their whole lives being under the control of their male relations.

The best educated and most intelligent