[Footnote 1:  Ch.  V., v. 148.]

The first love of a mother for her child is, with the lower animals as with men, of a purely instinctive character, and so it ceases when the child is no longer in a physically helpless condition.  After that, the first love should give way to one that is based on habit and reason; but this often fails to make its appearance, especially where the mother did not love the father.  The love of a father for his child is of a different order, and more likely to last; because it has its foundation in the fact that in the child he recognizes his own inner self; that is to say, his love for it is metaphysical in its origin.

In almost all nations, whether of the ancient or the modern world, even amongst the Hottentots,[1] property is inherited by the male descendants alone; it is only in Europe that a departure has taken place; but not amongst the nobility, however.  That the property which has cost men long years of toil and effort, and been won with so much difficulty, should afterwards come into the hands of women, who then, in their lack of reason, squander it in a short time, or otherwise fool it away, is a grievance and a wrong as serious as it is common, which should be prevented by limiting the right of women to inherit.  In my opinion, the best arrangement would be that by which women, whether widows or daughters, should never receive anything beyond the interest for life on property secured by mortgage, and in no case the property itself, or the capital, except where all male descendants fail.  The people who make money are men, not women; and it follows from this that women are neither justified in having unconditional possession of it, nor fit persons to be entrusted with its administration.  When wealth, in any true sense of the word, that is to say, funds, houses or land, is to go to them as an inheritance they should never be allowed the free disposition of it.  In their case a guardian should always be appointed; and hence they should never be given the free control of their own children, wherever it can be avoided.  The vanity of women, even though it should not prove to be greater than that of men, has this much danger in it, that it takes an entirely material direction.  They are vain, I mean, of their personal beauty, and then of finery, show and magnificence.  That is just why they are so much in their element in society.  It is this, too, which makes them so inclined to be extravagant, all the more as their reasoning power is low.  Accordingly we find an ancient writer describing woman as in general of an extravagant nature—­[Greek:  Gynae to synolon esti dapanaeron Physei][2] But with men vanity often takes the direction of non-material advantages, such as intellect, learning, courage.

[Footnote 1:  Leroy, Lettres philosophiques sur l’intelligence et la perfectibilite des animaux, avec quelques lettres sur l’homme, p. 298, Paris, 1802.]

[Footnote 2:  Brunck’s Gnomici poetae graeci, v. 115.]