The opinions expressed are in all cases my own. I say this without any apology of modesty. I hold that the one justification of writing a book at all is to state those truths one has learnt from one's own experience of life. For we can give to others only what we have received ourselves; the vision rising in our own eyes, the passion born in our own hearts.

C. Gasquoine Hartley.

7, Carlton Terrace,
Child's Hill, N.W.
March, 1913.

CONTENTS

N.B.—A complete synopsis of contents will be found at the beginning of each chapter

CHAP. PAGE
I[Introduction—The Starting-Point of the Inquiry]1
[PART I—BIOLOGICAL SECTION]
II[The Origin of the Sexes]31
III[Growth and Reproduction]45

I The Early Position of the Sexes.

II Two Examples—The Beehive and the Spider.
IV[The Early Relationship of the Sexes]71
V[Courtship, Marriage, and the Family]85

I Among the Birds and Mammals.

II Further Examples of Courtship, Marriage, and the Family among Birds.
[PART II—HISTORICAL SECTION]
VI[The Mother-Age Civilisation]117

I Progress from Lower to Higher Forms of the Family Relationship.

II The Matriarchal Family in America.

III Further Examples of the Matriarchal Family in Australia, India, and other Countries.

IV The Transition in Father-right.
VII[Woman's Position in the Great Civilisations of Antiquity]177

I In Egypt.

II In Babylon.

III In Greece.

IV In Rome.
[PART III—MODERN SECTION: PRESENT-DAY ASPECTS OF THE WOMAN PROBLEM]
VIII[Sex Differences]245
IX[Application of the Foregoing Chapter with Some Further Remarks on Sex Difference]271

I Women and Labour.

II Sexual Differences in Mind and the Artistic Impulse in Women.

III The Affectability of Woman—Its Connection with the Religious Impulse.
X[The Social Forms of the Sexual Relationship]329

I Marriage.

II Divorce.

III Prostitution.
XI[The End of the Inquiry]375