AUTHOR. A contradiction, Master.
PROUDHON. "The dignity of the human soul consists in being unwilling to suffer any one of its powers to subordinate the others, to require all to be at the service of the collective whole; this is morality, this is virtue. Whoever speaks of harmony or agreement, in fact, necessarily supposes terms in opposition. Attempt a hierarchy, a prepotence! you think to create order, you create nothing but absolutism."—Justice, Vol. II.
AUTHOR. Woman, according to you, forms with man an organism, that of justice. Now, according to you, the two halves of the androgynus have different qualities, which are required to harmonize with each other in equality under pain of creating absolutism instead of order; the feminine faculty is therefore required to form an equipoise with the masculine faculty.
PROUDHON. It is logical; but I conclude that the dignity of the humanitary androgynus lies in subjugating the feminine faculty and creating despotism, because man is the stronger.
AUTHOR. A contradiction, Master.
PROUDHON. "Justice is the respect spontaneously felt for and reciprocally guarantied to human dignity, in whatever person and whatever circumstance it may be found compromised."—Justice, Vol. I.
AUTHOR. Now, woman is a human being, possessing a dignity which should be respected and guarantied by the law of reciprocity; therefore one cannot be wanting in respect to feminine dignity without being wanting in justice.
PROUDHON. It is logical; but although woman is a human being, identical in species with man, and although I believe that there is no other basis of right than equality, I nevertheless affirm that the dignity of woman is inferior to that of man, because he is the stronger.
AUTHOR. A contradiction, Master.
PROUDHON. "Right is to each the faculty of exacting from others respect for human dignity in his person," duty is "the obligation of each to respect this dignity in another."—Justice, Vol. I.