70 MARRIAGE AND HEREDITY 



dictates of mediteval platonism. Such deference to 

 womanhood is a characteristic of modern Europe 

 alone ; it is not to be found in any other age or among 

 any other people. In a scientific sense this emanci- 

 pation of the weaker sex from a state of real or com- 

 parative bondage can hardly be overrated, seeing that 

 it has been the means of ensuring to woman a freedom 

 of action, a power of initiative, the exercise of a right 

 of selection, denied to her in a great measure during 

 the long infancy of the human race. While the com- 

 fortable doctrine prevailed, as it did during the Hindu, 

 Egyptian, Greek, and Eoman civilisations, that the 

 father alone determined the character of the child, 

 the wife's preferences in the matter of a husband were 

 counted as naught, and systematically repressed. 

 That is still the rule in polygamous countries at the 

 present day ; and its results are seen in the backward 

 condition of three-fourths of the human race. 



