See also Note XVII., 8.
XXXV.
1, 2.—“... fearing that the slave herself might guess
The knavery of her forced enchainedness.”
“Here I believe is the clue to the feeling of those men who have a real antipathy to the equal freedom of women. I believe they are afraid, not lest women should be unwilling to marry ... but lest they should insist that marriage should be on equal conditions; but all women of spirit and capacity should prefer doing almost anything else, not in their own eyes degrading, rather than marry, when marrying is giving themselves a master, and a master too of all their earthly possessions. And truly, if this consequence were necessarily incident to marriage, I think that the apprehension would be very well founded.”—J S. Mill (“The Subjection of Women,” p. 51).
See also Note XL., 4.
5.—“... dogmas ...”
These dogmas which, under the guise of religion, were imposed on the acceptance of womanhood, may be aptly summarised and epitomised in the following lines from one of the hierarchs of the system:—
“To whom thus Eve, with perfect beauty adorn’d:
‘My author and disposer, what thou bidd’st