Page:The rights of women and the sexual relations.djvu/34

18 that men who have led a dissolute life are changed into women after death — a poor compliment to the sex of whom Goethe says: "The eternal womanly draws us on."

In the "Republic," moreover, Plato says: "Women are physically somewhat weaker than men, but they are otherwise equally adapted to all occupations. In order that they may become able to use all their faculties they must receive the same education as boys, join in the common exercises, not modestly cover up their bodies, etc., etc. I demand the same end and aim for women as for men." (It remains only for Plato to declare it to be the end and aim of woman to become a man. Perhaps it is he who has brought about the mistaken view that it is the purpose of the emancipation of woman to deny femininity and to imitate men.) For the rest, women must be entirely common property, no woman can belong to a single individual. (Thus women are the absolute property of the men.) Moreover, no son is allowed to know a particular father. All must dine together publicly and live together. The State — and that is the non plus ultra of brutality — officially brings about the pairing of such persons as it deems the most fit for the procreation of children. When generation has taken place they separate again (a regular institution of stirpiculture). The children are reared by the State without being known by their mothers, so that these sometimes