A few words may here be said as to the dubitable question of the relative size of the brain in man and woman, though the matter may not be of great import, from more than one reason. For, as Bebel observes: “Altogether the investigations on the subject are too recent and too few in number to allow of any definite conclusions” (p. 123). A. Dumas fils says (“Les Femmes qui Tuent,” p. 196)—“Les philosophes vous démontreront que, si la force musculaire de l’homme est plus grande que celle de la femme, la force nerveuse de la femme est plus grande que celle de l’homme; que, si l’intelligence tient, comme on l’affirme aujourd’hui, au développement et au poids de la matière cérébrale, l’intelligence de la femme pourrait être déclarée supérieure à celle de l’homme, le plus grand cerveau et le plus lourd comme poids, étant un cerveau de femme lequel pesait 2,200 grammes, c’est a dire 400 grammes de plus que celui de Cuvier. On ne dit pas, il est vrai, que cette femme ait écrit l’équivalent du livre de Cuvier sur les fossiles.”
To which last remark may be replied, again in the words of Bebel,—“Darwin is perfectly right in saying that a list of the most distinguished women in poetry, painting, sculpture, music, science, and philosophy, will bear no comparison with a similar list of the most distinguished men. But surely this need not surprise us. It would be surprising if it were not so. Dr. Dodel-Port (in “Die neuere Schöpfungsgeschichte”) answers to the point, when he maintains that the relative achievements would be very different after men and women had received the same education and the same training in art and science during a certain number of generations.”—(“Woman,” p. 125.)
“It is of small value to say—yes, but look how many men excel and how few women do so. True, but see how much repression men have exercised to prevent women from even equalling them, and how much shallowness of mind they have encouraged. All manner of obstructions, coupled with ridicule, have been put in their way, and until women succeed in emancipating themselves, most men will probably continue to do so, simply because they have the power to do it. When women become emancipated, that is, are placed on social equality with men, this senseless, mischievous opposition will die a natural death.”—E. Bonavia, M.D. (“Woman’s Frontal Lobes”).
To revert to the question of brain weight, one of the first of English specialists says:—
“Data might, therefore, be considered to show, in the strongest manner, how comparatively unimportant is mere bulk or weight of brain in reference to the degree of intelligence of its owner, when considered as it often is, apart from the much more important question of the relative amount of its grey matter, as well as of the amount and perfection of the minute internal development of the organ either actual or possible.”—Dr. H. C. Bastian (“The Brain as an Organ of Mind,” p. 375.)
The American physiologist Helen H. Gardener states:—“The differences (in brain) between individuals of the same sex—in adults at least, are known to be much more marked than any that are known to exist between the sexes. Take the brains of the two poets Byron and Dante. Byron’s weighed 1,807 grammes, while Dante’s weighed only 1,320 grammes, a difference of 487 grammes. Or take two statesmen, Cromwell and Gambetta. Cromwell’s brain weighed 2,210 grammes, which, by the way, is the greatest healthy brain on record; although Cuvier’s is usually quoted as the largest, a part of the weight of his was due to disease, and if a diseased or abnormal brain is to be taken as the standard, then the greatest on record is that of a negro criminal idiot; while Gambetta’s was only 1,241 grammes, a difference of 969 grammes. Surely it will not be held because of this that Gambetta and Dante should have been denied the educational and other advantages which were the natural right of Byron and Cromwell. Yet it is upon this very ground, by this very system of reasoning, that it is proposed to deny women equal advantages and opportunities, although the difference in brain weight between man and woman is said to be only 100 grammes, and even this does not allow for difference in body weight, and is based upon a system of averages, which is neither complete nor accurate.”—(Report of the International Council of Women, Washington, 1888, p. 378.)
Concerning an assertion that “the specific gravity of both the white and grey matter of the brain is greater in man than in woman,” Helen H. Gardener says:—“Of this point this is what the leading brain anatomist in America (Dr. E. C. Spitzka) wrote: ‘The only article recognised by the profession as important and of recent date, which takes this theory as a working basis, is by Morselli, and he is compelled to make the sinister admission, while asserting that the specific gravity is less in the female, that with old age and with insanity the specific gravity increases.’ If this is the case I do not know that women need sigh over their shortcoming in the item of specific gravity. There appear to be two very simple methods open to them by which they may emulate their brothers in the matter of specific gravity, if they so desire. One of these is certain, if they live long enough; and the other—well, there is no protective tariff on insanity.”—(Loc. cit., p. 379.)
Helen Gardener further appositely observes:—“The brain of no remarkable woman has ever been examined. Woman is ticketed to fit the hospital subjects and tramps, the unfortunates whose brains fall into the hands of the profession as it were by mere accident, while man is represented by the brains of the Cromwells, Cuviers, Byrons, and Spurzheims. By this method the average of men’s brains is carried to its highest level in the matter of weight and texture; while that of women is kept at its lowest, and even then there is only claimed 100 grammes’ difference!”—(Loc. cit., p. 380.)
And she concludes her exhaustive paper with the closing paragraph of a letter to herself from Dr. E. C. Spitzka, the celebrated New York brain specialist:—“You may hold me responsible for the following declaration: That any statement to the effect that an observer can tell by looking at a brain, or examining it microscopically, whether it belonged to a female or a male subject, is not founded on carefully-observed facts.... No such difference has ever been demonstrated, nor do I think it will be by more elaborate methods than we now possess. Numerous female brains exceed numerous male brains in absolute weight, in complexity of convolutions, and in what brain anatomists would call the nobler proportions. So that he who takes these as his criteria of the male brain may be grievously mistaken in attempting to assert the sex of a brain dogmatically. If I had one hundred female brains and one hundred male brains together, I should select the one hundred containing the largest and best-developed brains as probably containing fewer female brains than the remaining one hundred. More than this no cautious experienced brain anatomist would venture to declare.”—(Loc. cit., p. 381.)
Charles Darwin has clearly summarised this question of comparison of brain:—“No one, I presume, doubts that the large size of the brain in man, relatively to his body, in comparison with that of the gorilla or orang, is closely connected with his higher mental powers.... On the other hand, no one supposes that the intellect of any two animals or of any two men can be accurately gauged by the cubic contents of their skulls. It is certain that there may be extraordinary mental activity with an extremely small absolute mass of nervous matter; thus the wonderfully diversified instincts, mental powers, and affections of ants are generally known, yet their cerebral ganglia are not so large as the quarter of a small pin’s head. Under this latter point of view the brain of an ant is one of the most marvellous atoms of matter in the world, perhaps more marvellous than the brain of man.”—(“The Descent of Man,” Chap. IV.)