354 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



attained very great eminence as conversationalists, as actresses, and 

 as novelists. In the ethics of intellect they are decidedly inferior. 

 Women very rarely love truth, though they love passionately what 

 they call ' the truth,' or opinions they have received from others. They 

 are little capable of impartiality or of doubt ; their thinking is chiefly 

 a mode of feeling ; though very generous in their acts they are rarely 

 generous in their opinions, and their leaning is naturally to the side of 

 restriction. They persuade rather than convince, and value belief 

 rather as a source of consolation than as a faithful expression of the 

 reality of things. They are less capable than men of distinguishing 

 the personal character of an opponent from the opinions he maintains. 

 Their affections are concentrated rather on leaders than on causes, and 

 if they care for a great cause it is generally because it is represented 

 by a great man, or connected with some one whom they love. In 

 politics their enthusiasm is more naturally loyalty than patriotism. In 

 benevolence they excel in charity rather than in philanthropy." While 

 I can not believe that Lecky's statement is entirely unprejudiced, I 

 think no one will deny that the views which I have quoted agree in 

 the main with those which have gained general acceptance in the past. 

 At the present time, however, there is a growing tendency to regard the 

 relations of the sexes as due in great part to male selfishness ; and 

 while the substantial correctness of our view of the differences between 

 the male and the female character is acknowledged, its origin is attrib- 

 uted to the " subjection " of women by men. In this paper I have at- 

 tempted to present reasons, which I believe are new, for regarding the 

 differences as natural and of the greatest importance to the race. 



Those who acknowledge the weight of my argument, as applied to 

 evolution in the past, may, however, question its applicability to the 

 human evolution of the future. It may fairly be urged that while we 

 grant that the course of evolution from the lower forms of life up to 

 rational man has been by the slow process of variation and heredity, 

 we have now passed into a new order of things, and the great advances 

 of the human race have been and are now brought about by the much 

 more rapid and totally dissimilar process of intelligent education. It 

 may be urged that heredity does very little more for the civilized than 

 for the savage child, and that the wide difference between the savage 

 and the civilized adult is mainly the result of the training and instruc- 

 tion of the individual ; that it has not been brought about by the de- 

 struction of those children whose congenital share in the results of the 

 intellectual advancement of the race is most scanty. It may be urged 

 that, since man has reached a point where progress is almost entirely 

 intellectual, and depends upon his own efforts, he is free from the laws 

 by which development up to that point was reached. 



We are not concerned at present with the question how far prog- 

 ress might be accelerated by intelligent selection, and we may there- 

 fore conditionally accept the view that future progress, for some time 



