GROWTH AND REPRODUCTION, 609 



In women, if there is a greater arrest of individual growth than in 

 men, the difference begins in the foetal life ; their comparative weight 

 and size at birth are the same as at maturity ; and, if the former finish 

 their growth earlier, it must be because relatively they grow more 

 rapidly. The feminine circulation and respiration are both quicker; 

 and so are the female mental processes. When the whole subject has 

 been quantitatively investigated with sufiicient exactness, I believe it 

 will be found that, what man has gained in '' massiveness," woman has 

 gained in rapidity of action ; and that all their powers o^ body and 

 mind, mathematically computed^ are, and will continue to be, real and 

 true equivalents. The premises are already sufiiciently known to com- 

 pel me to this conclusion. 



One point more. Physical and psychical growth in man are not 

 arrested simultaneously. After the body has ceased to grow, the 

 brain-system still enlarging and compacting its highly-mobile struct- 

 ure, mental power increases long after the more rigid, merely mechan- 

 ical forces have reached their maximum. The same law applies, at 

 least, in equal degrees to woman. If there is any proof that feminine 

 psychical pow' ers normally reach an earlier cessation of growth than 

 the masculine, then, so far as I can learn, no scientist has yet collated 

 the facts and put them before the world in evidence. On the con- 

 trary, so far is the earlier physical maturity of w^oman from necessi- 

 tating a corresponding earlier psychical maturity, that, in the light 

 of physiological relations, we may deduce the exactly opposite hy- 

 pothesis. 



In woman, maximum mental power should be reached at a consid- 

 erably later period than in man, because the greater cost of reproduc- 

 tion, though related chiefly to the physical economy, is indirectly 

 psychical ; tending to diminish intellectual action also, and to retard 

 its evolution. The cost of all reproductive provisions fully met, and 

 the child-bearing age at an end, the special constitutional tendency to 

 accumulate reserve force will not be immediately destroyed. Func- 

 tions, active hitherto in the interest of posterity, go on now to accumu- 

 late in the interest of the individual. Still further, the naturally less 

 overtaxed intellectual faculties of woman now have this advantage 

 also over those of man — an advantage at least as great as the previous 

 disadvantage. 



When the vast weight of past social conditions is considered, that 

 women thus far have failed to acquire large powers of abstract thinking 

 and feeling, affords no reason for supposing that there is a correspond- 

 ing constitutional lack of ability in this direction. They attain an 

 earlier growth, but, that they reach the highest point even of physical 

 vigor earlier than men, we have no evidence. Many facts indicate 

 otherwise. Men and women live to equal ages, retain their vigor to 

 equal ages — those using the greater force more slowly, those the lesser 

 force more rapidly — thus with uneven steps keeping even pace in physi- 

 voL. v.— 39 



