Views On Mary Wollstonecraft's Rights Of Woman

Mark Jason Manalang Manalang 1
British History II
Michael D. Hole
04 April 2013
Assignment #2
1)Mary Wollstonecraft believes that society has trained women to “act” like animals and are seen as perpetual children. She mentions that “Women are told from their infancy, and taught by the example of their mothers, that a little knowledge of human weakness, justly termed cunning, softness of temper, outward obedience, and a scrupulous attention to a puerile kind of propriety, will obtain them for them the protection of man; and should they be beautiful, everything else is needless..” (Wollstonecraft, Rights of Woman, page 2, paragraph 8.). Wollstonecraft also believes that “the instruction of which women have hitherto received has only tended,
with the constitution of civil society to render them insignificant objects of desire” (Wollstonecraft, Rights of Woman, page 1, paragraph 3.).
besides being objects of desire and perpetual children, Mary Wollstonecraft goes on to say that women are typically seen as weak or that they should be. According to her, a woman may “use art and feign a sickly delicacy in order to secure her husband's affection” and that “weakness may excite tenderness, and gratify the arrogant pride of man” (Wollstonecraft, Rights of Woman,page 2, paragraph 5.). Wollstonecraft also includes that not only can this affect women negatively, but also the people who are directly accountable to her, since “a man of sense can only love such a woman on account of her sex, and respect her, because she is a trusty servant. He lets her, to preserve his own peace, scold the servants, and go to church in clothes made of the very best materials....Yet, women, whose minds are not enlarge by cultivation, or the natural selfishness of sensibility expanded by reflection, are very unfit to manage a family; for, by an undue stretch of power, they are always tyrannizing to support a superiority that only
rests on the arbitrary distinction of fortune.” (Wollstonecraft, Rights of Woman, page 2, paragraph 6.).
2)Wollstonecraft believes that a woman should receive an education that is mentally, emotionally and physically fulfilling since this will teach women how to become strong and independent but not without the qualities to make her a good mother and wife. According to Wollstonecraft, “the most perfect education, in my opinion, is such an exercise of the understanding as is best calculated to, strengthen the body and form of the heart. Or in other words, to enable the individual to attain such habits of virtue as will render it independent.” (Wollstonecraft, Rights of Woman, page 1, paragraph 4.). her main principle is “that if she not be prepared by education to become the companion of man, she will stop the progress of knowledge and virtue; for truth must be common to all, or it will be inefficacious with respect to its influence on general practice.” (Wollstonecraft, Rights of Woman,page 1, paragraph 1.). She believes that women can't only be confined to domestic concerns; “For they will , however ignorant, intermeddle with more weighty, neglecting more private duties only to disturb, by cunning tricks, the orderly plans of reason which rise above their comprehension.” (Wollstonecraft, Rights of Woman, page 2, paragraph 9.). the perfect education for women, according to Mary Wollstonecraft, is one in which “Women endeavor to acquire strength, both of mind and body, and to convince them that the soft phrases, susceptibility of heart, delicacy of sentiment, and refinement of taste, are almost synonymous with epithets of weakness, and that those beings who are only the objects of pity and that kind of love, which has been termed its sister, will soon become objects of contempt...” (Wollstonecraft, Rights of Woman, page 2, paragraph 7.).
3) Wollstonecraft believes that a relationship between a man and woman would be perfect if they were equal in education and how they treated each other, without neglecting the duties that each of them must contribute to create harmony.
She states that “Let there be no coercion established in society, and the common law of gravity prevailing, the sexes will fall into their proper places...The father of a family will not then weaken his constitution and debate his sentiments, by visiting the harlot, nor forget , in obeying the call of appetite, the purpose for which it was implanted. And the mother will not neglect her children to practice the arts of coquetry, when sense and modesty secure her the friendship of her husband.” (Wollstonecraft, Rights of Woman, page 2, paragraph 10.). Wollstonecraft believes that if this was the basis of every relationship, “mankind, including woman, will become more virtuous and wise....Let woman share the rights and she will emulate the virtues of man; for she must grow more perfect when emancipated.” (Wollstonecraft, Rights of Woman, page 2, paragraph
12.).