1878.] Considered from a Biological Point of View . 475 
who, if they do not structurally approximate to the female 
sex, betray a preference for feminine occupations, which wins 
for them such epithets as “ molly-cots,” “ cot-queans,” &c. 
At the risk of somewhat anticipating ourselves we cannot 
suppress the remark that no one demands especial laws and 
institutions for the benefit of such womanish men, or pro- 
poses their exemption from the customary duties of the 
male sex, how burdensome soever these may be felt. 
The third and last plea put forward to explain, if possible, 
the cerebral inferiority of woman and her concomitant in- 
tellectual inferiority, is an adaptation of the one already 
proposed to account for her smaller physical strength. It is 
gravely asserted that mental activity in art or science has 
been systematically repressed among women, and that in 
consequence their cerebral development has been injuriously 
interfered with. To this contention it would be a sufficient 
reply were we to simply point to the faCt already mentioned, 
that the relative inferiority in the size of the brain of women, 
instead of diminishing as their social status has improved, 
has, on the contrary, been increasing. We may hence fairly 
argue that it exists not in virtue of any artificial interference, 
but of a law of Nature. We can, however, adduce other 
considerations. In the pursuit of the fine arts, woman, in- 
stead of being checked and hindered, whether by law or by 
social conventions, has been encouraged. An acquaintance 
with music has been literally forced upon every girl of the 
upper and middle classes. Yet, leaving composers out of the 
question, how many of the million female performers on the 
pianoforte, now to be be found in Europe and America, can 
take rank with Liszt and Thalberg ? In the highest deve- 
lopment of literature, poetry, sex has been no obstacle to 
the recognition of merit. Yet neither Sappho in the past 
nor Mrs. Hemans and Mrs. Browning in our own day can 
be placed even in the same class with the leading poets of 
Greece, England, and Germany. 
Women have certainly till of late met with few diredt 
facilities for the pursuit of science. But, in England at 
least, neither have men. Our great scientific discoverers, 
until quite recent days, have been substantially self-taught, 
and even if in their youth they enjoyed a university education 
their subsequent researches, though post hoc , have assuredly 
not been propter hoc . Scientific books and apparatus have 
been as accessible to one sex as to the other ; and these have 
generally been the only opportunities that our discoverers 
have had at their command. How to use such appliances 
they had to discover for themselves. We deny, therefore, 
