You do not currently have permission to view the full text for this document. Please sign in to an account with an active subscription or contact support.
The fame of Mary Wollstonecraft, 1759-1797, rests chiefly upon one of her books entitled, A Vindication of the Rights of Woman, published in 1792. She was one of the first of the dedicated feminists. According to her husband, the philosopher William Godwin (1798, p. 163), she was, “The firmest champion, and, as I strongly suspect, the greatest ornament her sex ever had to boast.” While this may be an exaggerated statement, there is no doubt of the great impress she has effectuated on the minds of both men and women. While Taylor (1911, p. 33) says, “… it would be quite absurd to claim for Mary Wollstonecraft that she was the first to prove the right of women to stand as equals with men,” he does claim (p. 34), “… her uniqueness is that she was the first to put the claim into the shape of a theoretical thesis.” When the history of the subsequent struggle of women to achieve a better life is reviewed, the clear impression is gained that Mary Wollstonecraft has remained a moving force and inspiration of the first rank.
The main thesis of her book is that woman, like man, has a God-given reasoning power which she has the obligation to develop. To this end she requires, and should be permitted to have, a very complete education. This would render her self-supporting and independent, so that she need not rely on marriage, which at that time put women in a state of slavery, for her subsistence. No one disputes this view today, although put forth at the end of the eighteenth century, it was a daring innovation. Had her own behavior been more exemplary according to the prevailing mores of her period, she would have found wider acceptance during her lifetime.
One of the most striking opinions she promulgated, and one