Mary Wollstonecraft
“I earnestly wish to persuade women to endeavour to acquire strength, both of mind and body.”
“Make women rational creatures, and free citizens, and they will quickly become good wives.”
“Taught from their infancy that beauty is woman's sceptre, the mind shapes itself to the body, and roaming round its gilt cage, only seeks to adorn its prison.”
“Women ought to have representatives, instead of being arbitrarily governed without one, in a country where they are taxed.”
“Virtue can only flourish among equals.”
“It is justice, not charity, that is wanting in the world.”
“Independence I have long considered as the grand blessing of life, the basis of every virtue.”
“No man chooses evil because it is evil; he only mistakes it for happiness, the good he seeks.”
“Strengthen the female mind by enlarging it, and there will be an end to blind obedience.”
“I do not wish them [women] to have power over men; but over themselves.”