M. A. Hardaker

“ If our facts are reliable, and the reasoning correct, it must be admitted as proved that the factor of size has given man a superiority over woman, which he will always retain while he retains his larger body and brain. The absolute gain in time which his greater size has given him can not be set aside, unless he should cease to be the medium of transformation of energy, and should wait a few centuries for woman to overtake him, as he might have waited for her to swallow her pound of bread. ”

“ We shall, doubtless, some time find it to be as complete a physical impossibility for a small and simply organized brain to do a great amount of thinking within a given time as for a small heart to eject a large quantity of blood at each beat, or for small lungs to absorb large amounts of oxygen at each inspiration. ”

“ If, now, we may further suppose this pound of bread converted into its equivalent of thought, it is evident that a pound of bread will represent as much thought in a woman's brain as in a man's; but, as her smaller organs refuse to assimilate as fast as his, the larger organism will have a permanent advantage over the smaller one in the element of time. Any other conclusion than the one just stated implies a contradiction of the established relations of matter and force, and there is a general historic corroboration of this idea in the actual record of sex activity. ”

“ Yet it is most probable that we may at some time establish an exact correspondence between brain-substance and intelligence, as the size and condition of the lungs yield an exact measure of the breathing power, and as the contractile muscle of the heart measures the quantity of blood ejected at each pulsation. In the case of every other organ of the body we know that there is an ascertainable correspondence between size and condition, and the amount of work which the organ can do. Is there any good reason for making an exception of the brain? ”

“ The perpetuation of the human species is dependent on the function of maternity, and probably twenty per cent of the energy of women between twenty and forty years of age is diverted for the maintenance of maternity and its attendant exactions. Upon the supposition that woman's mental endowment were exactly equal to man's, the amount diverted to maternity must be continually subtracted from it, so that any original equality of intellect would certainly be lost through maternity. ”

“ Consequently, the man will do more thinking in an hour than the woman. Nor will the woman ever be able to overtake the man in the race of thought, any more than she can overtake him in the amount of circulation; for his brain is of exactly the same quality as hers, but it is larger.
In order to see more clearly the importance of the factor of time in this calculation, as well as to get a clearer understanding of the law of the transformation of energy, let us make the further supposition that a pound of bread is gradually converted into vital energy in both these organisms. ”

“ Let us now consider with more attention the general physiological law that quantity of power is in proportion to the size of the body. This brings us to the still more fundamental principle of the inseparability of matter and force. ”

“ It is not unlikely that the still imperfectly known laws of heredity have increased the intellectual endowment of the male, for Mr. Darwin finds a general law of transmission in the line of sex. If, too, we accept Mr. Spencer's proof of the inverse ratio between individuation and multiplication, we see that intellectual mothers will have fewer daughters than unintellectual ones; so that the chances of transmission of intellectual qualities in the female line will be lessened as culture increases among mothers. ”

“ Nevertheless, if it could be shown that the energy derived from food in men were an energy of inferior quality, women might gain a compensating factor in quality of thought. By the consent of competent judges, the reasoning power and the creative imagination are the highest and most complex forms of brain-energy. We have the most abundant evidence that, while man possesses both these powers in large amount and of superior quality, woman possesses them in much smaller amount and of inferior quality ”

“ By reflecting that no such original equality ever existed, but that, on the contrary, a considerable physical superiority has been the possession of man from the beginning; by remembering that, in the perpetual struggle for existence, man's physical and intellectual faculties have been stimulated to the utmost in gaining the means of life for himself and for his weaker mate and offspring ”

“ Again, it is an accepted truth of modern science that all human energy is derived from the food, and is an exact equivalent of the amount of food consumed and assimilated. The amount of food assimilated by men exceeds the amount assimilated by women by about twenty per cent. This fact has popular recognition in the higher rate of board demanded for men. It inevitably follows that man, as a sex, representing more food-assimilation than woman, must represent more energy of some kind. ”

“ Now, if we suppose these two persons to be under similar and normal conditions, with each organ bearing a harmonious relation in size to every other—i. e., if the brain of the man have the same proportion to the weight of his body as the brain of the woman to the weight of her body it inevitably follows (if both assimilate proportionate amounts of food in a given time) that more blood will be sent to the brain of the man within a given time than to the brain of the woman in the same time. ”

“ We value brains for thought as we value looms for manufacture. A barrel of brains is of no account, unless we can evolve from them a steam-engine or a poem. We have seen it hinted, in a recent essay by Dr. Bedell, of Chicago, that women probably possess a larger amount of actual nervous matter, in proportion to the size of the body, than men. ”

“ If it were possible to collect all the results of the muscular activity of men, from the beginning of civilization until the present, and likewise all the results of the muscular activity of women for the same period, we should reason instantaneously, from these phenomena, to the superior quality of masculine muscle. We should need no resurrection of dead men and women to demonstrate the difference. ”

“ Woman's inferior size and power will forbid her becoming the successful rival of man in the struggle for existence. Consequently, she will miss the powerful intellectual stimulus which this competition creates among men. Lastly, while society continues to exist, she will always be obliged to expend a large proportion of her energy in the function of maternity. ”

“ A large amount of matter represents more force than a small amount; and this law includes vital organisms as well as inorganic masses. Under proper conditions for test, the amount of power evolved by any vital organism is in direct ratio to the size and weight of that organism. This settles the question of quantity of power permanently in favor of man. The weight of all the men of civilized countries would exceed that of all the women by perhaps fifteen or twenty per cent. ”

“ ALMOST all social reforms are made top-heavy by a false philosophy. Facts are of easy accumulation, but the scientific rule of deducing no principle which facts will not prove gets but unwilling countenance from reform agitators. ”

“ If the collective weights and food-assimilating capacities of men should ever fall below those of women, there would follow a reversal of the present relations; but, while these two facts remain, it follows, with mathematical certainty, that the amount of power evolved by men must exceed that evolved by women. ”

“ Women have done something of nearly everything that men have done, but they have come later and with smaller offerings. The time-factor is one which we are bound to include in casting up our column of probabilities for the future intellectual equality of the sexes. ”

“ We have as much external evidence of the superior quality of the masculine brain as of the superior breathing power of the masculine lungs, or of the superior absorbing power of the masculine stomach. We do not examine a muscle to ascertain its internal structure. ”

“ In a large proportion the male brain ranges between 46 and 53 ounces, and the female between 41 and 47 ounces. A mean average weight of 49 ounces may be deduced for the male, and of 44 ounces for the female brain." It is further given, on the authority of Gratiolet and others, that the male brain can not fall below 37 ounces without involving idiocy; while the female may fall to 32 ounces without such a result. AH accepted authorities agree that the average male brain exceeds the average female brain in weight by about ten per cent. ”

“ The reform philosophy which asks for the elevation of women admits an inferiority of position and power on their part, but at the same time claims that this inferiority is due to temporary causes. It bridges the broad gulf between masculine and feminine achievement by the excuse of a different environment. ”

“ We hear the power of intuition quoted as a higher one than reason. Women possess this power in a higher degree than men, and are sometimes rated above them in consequence of it. Very little study has been bestowed on this faculty, which has been the occasion of so much self-congratulation to women. ”

“ Professor Thurnam also adds, "The brain-weight of the male negro is the same as that of the female European."
Of qualitative differences of brain we know next to nothing; we can not study quality from the physiological side, but are driven to an appeal to the concrete products of brain activity. ”

“ But nervous matter distributed over the body, in the form of threads and sensory ganglia, although it would certainly increase the amount of sensitiveness, by giving more nervous surface in proportion to the entire mass, would tend to create a preponderance of emotion over thought. Very strong probability is lent to this explanation by the liability of women to nervous excitement and disease. ”

“ It is generally admitted that with woman the powers of intuition, of rapid perception, and perhaps of imitation, are more strongly marked than in man; but some, at least, of these faculties are characteristic of the lower races, and therefore of a past and lower state of civilization. ”

“ This diversion of power would also occur in the years of highest physical vigor. This period in man is that of most active intellectual development, because the physical basis of intellectual energy is most abundant in these years. ”

“ But there is considerable evidence that it is acquired by heredity, that it is closely akin to instinct, and that some modification of it is the common possession of women, children, and the lower animals. ”

“ It is possessed in a lower degree by men, but has escaped registration as a masculine trait. In his classification of the mental powers of the two sexes, Mr. Darwin puts observation, reason, imagination, and invention as those especially selected in man, and likeliest to be transmitted to male off-spring. ”

“ Let them be respectively that of a man weighing one hundred and fifty pounds, and that of a woman weighing one hundred and thirty pounds. These figures are not far from the average weight of man and woman. In the woman the digestive organs will be smaller ”