Top 100 Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes

#1. England and America owe their liberty to commerce, which created a new species of power to undermine the feudal system. But let them beware of the consequences: the tyranny of wealth is still more galling and debasing than that of rank.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #8436
#2. I do earnestly wish to see the distinction of sex confounded in society, unless where love animates the behaviour.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #16372
#3. A modest man is steady, an humble man timid, and a vain one presumptuous.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #36217
#4. The last man! Yes I may well describe that solitary being's feelings, feeling myself as the last relic of a beloved race, my companions extinct before me ...

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #58249
#5. Judicious books enlarge the mind and improve the heart ...

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #82631
#6. Either nature has made a great difference between man and man, or that the world is not yet anywhere near to being fully civilized.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #83516
#7. Virtue can only flourish among equals.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #88665
#8. An air of fashion, which is but a badge of slavery ... proves that the soul has not a strong individual character.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #100238
#9. I must be allowed to add some explanatory remarks to bring the subject home to reason-to that sluggish reason, which supinely takes opinions on trust, and obstinately supports them to spare itself the labour of thinking.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #122773
#10. What but a pestilential vapour can hover over society when its chief director is only instructed in the invention of crimes, or the stupid routine of childish ceremonies?

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #144633
#11. What, but the rapacity of the only men who exercised their reason, the priests, secured such vast property to the church, when a man gave his perishable substance to save himself from the dark torments of purgatory.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #153391
#12. Surely something resides in this heart that is not perishable - and life is more than a dream.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #170480
#13. It is justice, not charity, that is wanting in the world.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #180753
#14. Society can only be happy and free in proportion as it is virtuous.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #222741
#15. Men neglect the duties incumbent on man, yet are treated like demi-gods; religion is also separated from morality by a ceremonial veil, yet men wonder that the world is almost, literally speaking, a den of sharpers or oppressors.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #289425
#16. I like to see your eyes praise me and, during such recitals, there are interruptions, not ungrateful to the heart, when the honey that drops from the lips is not merely words.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #336703
#17. When any prevailing prejudice is attacked, the wise will consider, and leave the narrow-minded to rail with thoughtless vehemence at innovation.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #354731
#18. Every political good carried to the extreme must be productive of evil.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #362351
#19. The mind will ever be unstable that has only prejudices to rest on.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #375860
#20. The graceful ivy, clasping the oak that supported it, would form a whole in which strength and beauty would be equally conspicuous.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #376587
#21. Trifling employments have rendered woman a trifler.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #417503
#22. [...] and if then women do not resign the arbitrary power of beauty - they will prove that they have less mind than man.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #442700
#23. My own sex, I hope, will excuse me, if I treat them like rational creatures, instead of flattering their fascinating graces, and viewing them as if they were in a state of perpetual childhood, unable to stand alone.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #444532
#24. My husband - my king.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #478362
#25. The greater number of people take their opinions on trust, to avoid the trouble of exercising their own minds, and these indolent beings naturally adhere to the letter, rather than the spirit of a law, divine or human.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #479955
#26. Only that education deserves emphatically to be termed cultivation of the mind which teaches young people how to begin to think.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #487665
#27. I then supped with my companions, with whom I was soon after to part for ever - always a most melancholly, death-like idea - a sort of separation of soul; for all the regret which follows those from whom fate separates us, seems to be something torn from ourselves.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #497147
#28. And this homage to women's attractions has distorted their understanding to
such an extent that almost all the civilized women of the present century are anxious only to inspire love, when they ought to have the nobler aim of getting respect for their abilities and virtues.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #545220
#29. I love man as my fellow; but his scepter, real, or usurped, extends not to me, unless the reason of an individual demands my homage; and even then the submission is to reason, and not to man.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #553332
#30. I do not wish them [women] to have power over men; but over themselves.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #563936
#31. Nothing, I am sure, calls forth the faculties so much as the being obliged to struggle with the world.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #565135
#32. Wealth and female softness equally tend to debase mankind!

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #579615
#33. How frequently has melancholy and even misanthropy taken possession of me, when the world has disgusted me, and friends have proven unkind. I have then considered myself as a particle broken off from the grand mass of mankind.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #628557
#34. We reason deeply, when we forcibly feel.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #666549
#35. Love from its very nature must be transitory. To seek for a secret that would render it constant would be as wild a search as for the philosopher's stone or the grand panacea: and the discovery would be equally useless, or rather pernicious to mankind. The most holy band of society is friendship.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #678241
#36. The birthright of man ... is such a degree of liberty, civil and religious, as is compatible with the liberty of every other individual with whom he is united in a social compact.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #681723
#37. Friendship is a serious affection; the most sublime of all affections, because it is founded on principle, and cemented by time.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #690080
#38. Women are systematically degraded by receiving the trivial attentions which men think it manly to pay to their sex, when, in fact, men are insultingly supporting their own superiority.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #695968
#39. Situation seems to be the mould in which men's characters are formed.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #696222
#40. Considering the length of time that women have been dependent, is it surprising that some of them hug their chains, and fawn like the spaniel?

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #722828
#41. Weakness may excite tenderness, and gratify the arrogant pride of man; but the lordly caresses of a protector will not gratify a noble mind that pants for, and deserves to be respected. Fondness is a poor substitute for friendship.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #742608
#42. We never do any thing well, unless we love it for its own sake.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #761393
#43. Thus do we wish as we float down the stream of life, whilst chance does more to gratify our desire for knowledge than our best-laid plans.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #780106
#44. When we feel deeply, we reason profoundly.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #799895
#45. I never wanted but your heart
that gone, you have nothing more to give.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #800299
#46. It is vain to expect virtue from women till they are in some degree independent of men.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #803858
#47. They are the men of fancy, the favourites of the sex, who outwardly respect, and inwardly despise the weak creatures whom they thus sport with.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #826969
#48. The more equality there is established among men, the more virtue and happiness will reign in society.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #843519
#49. Life cannot be seen by an unmoved spectator.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #868919
#50. Nay the honour of the woman is not made even to depend on her will.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #930833
#51. True sensibility, the sensibility which is the auxiliary of virtue, and the soul of genius, is in society so occupied with the feelings of others, as scarcely to regard its own sensations.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #934288
#52. The same energy of character which renders a man a daring villain would have rendered him useful in society, had that society been well organized.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #945548
#53. I am an unfortunate and deserted creature, I look around and I have no relation or friend upon earth. These amiable people to whom I go have never seen me and know little of me. I am full of fears, for if I fail there, I am an outcast in the world forever.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #964113
#54. Those who are bold enough to advance before the age they live in ... must learn to brave censure.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #976916
#55. Let us, my dear contemporaries, arise above such narrow prejudices. If wisdom be desirable on its own account, if virtue, to deserve the name, must be founded on knowledge, let us endeavour to strengthen our minds by reflection till our heads become a balance for our hearts ...

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #1044809
#56. Pygmalion formed an ivory maid, and longed for an informing soul. She, on the contrary, combined all the qualities of a hero's mind, and fate presented a statue in which she might enshrine them.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #1058785
#57. Let their faculties have room to unfold, and their virtues to gain strength, and then determine where the whole sex must stand in the intellectual scale.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #1105731
#58. I think I love most people best when they are in adversity; for pity is one of my prevailing passions.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #1111870
#59. Maria was not permitted to walk in the garden; but sometimes, from her window, she turned her eyes from the gloomy walls, in which she pined life away, on the poor wretches who strayed along the walks, and contemplated the most terrific of ruins - that of a human soul.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #1118392
#60. In the education of women, the cultivation of the understanding is always subordinate to the acquirement of some corporeal accomplishment ...

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #1134966
#61. Some women govern their husbands without degrading themselves, because intellect will always govern.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #1138561
#62. The whole tenour of female education ... tends to render the best disposed romantic and inconstant; and the remainder vain and mean.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #1153968
#63. [I]f we revert to history, we shall find that the women who have distinguished themselves have neither been the most beautiful nor the most gentle of their sex.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #1161160
#64. The man who can be contented to live with a pretty and useful companion who has no mind has lost in voluptuous gratifications a taste for more refined pleasures; he has never felt the calm and refreshing satisfaction ... of being loved by someone who could understand him.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #1201467
#65. Why is our fancy to be appalled by terrific perspectives of a hell beyond the grave?

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #1201730
#66. If women be educated for dependence; that is, to act according to the will of another fallible being, and submit, right or wrong, to power, where are we to stop?

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #1213825
#67. I write in a hurry, because the little one, who has been sleeping a long time, begins to call for me. Poor thing! when I am sad, I lament that all my affections grow on me, till they become too strong for my peace, though they all afford me snatches of exquisite enjoyment.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #1215297
#68. It is the preservation of the species, not of individuals, which appears to be the design of Deity throughout the whole of nature.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #1264543
#69. They may be convenient slaves, but slavery will have its constant effect, degrading the master and the abject dependent.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #1275424
#70. Make women rational creatures, and free citizens, and they will quickly become good wives; - that is, if men do not neglect the duties of husbands and fathers.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #1327043
#71. The conduct of an accountable being must be regulated by the operations of its own reason ...

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #1339017
#72. How can a rational being be ennobled by any thing that is not obtained by its own exertions?

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #1357664
#73. When man, governed by reasonable laws, enjoys his natural freedom, let him despise woman, if she do not share it with him.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #1358731
#74. The two sexes mutually corrupt and improve each other.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #1364798
#75. To improve both sexes they ought, not only in private families, but in public schools, to be educated together. If marriage be the cement of society, mankind should all be educated after the same model, or the intercourse of the sexes will never deserve the name of fellowship ...

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #1366164
#76. A war, or any wild-goose chase, is, as the vulgar use the phrase, a lucky turn-up of patronage for the minister, whose chief merit is the art of keeping himself in place.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #1397944
#77. Modesty is the graceful, calm virtue of maturity; bashfulness the charm of vivacious youth.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #1406306
#78. It is time to effect a revolution in female manners - time to restore to them their lost dignity - and make them, as a part of the human species, labour by reforming themselves to reform the world. It is time to separate unchangeable morals from local manners.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #1444673
#79. Children, I grant, should be innocent; but when the epithet is applied to men, or women, it is but a civil term for weakness.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #1455447
#80. And, perhaps, in the education of both sexes, the most difficult task is so to adjust instruction as not to narrow the understanding, whilst the heart is warmed by the generous juices of spring ... nor to dry up the feelings by employing the mind in investigations remote from life.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #1455771
#81. The flexible muscles growing daily more rigid give character to the countenance ; that is, they trace the operations of the mind with the iron pen of fate, and tell us not only what powers are within, but how they have been employed.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #1461114
#82. But let me now stop; I may be a little partial, and view every thing with the jaundiced eye of melancholy - for I am sad - and have cause.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #1473685
#83. I begin to love this creature, and to anticipate her birth as a fresh twist to a knot, which I do not wish to untie.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #1480947
#84. Men and women must be educated, in a great degree, by the opinions and manners of the society they live in.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #1531772
#85. After attacking the sacred majesty of Kings, I shall scarcely excite surprise by adding my firm persuasion that every profession, in which great subordination of rank constitutes its power, is highly injurious to morality.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #1543986
#86. The endeavor to keep alive any hoary establishment beyond its natural date is often pernicious and always useless.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #1559729
#87. . . . so many fond mothers spoil their children, and has made it questionable whether negligence or indulgence be most hurtful: but I am inclined to think, that the latter has done most harm.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #1561005
#88. As a sex, women are habitually indolent; and every thing tends to make them so.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #1590072
#89. Let woman share the rights and she will emulate the virtues of man; for she must grow more perfect when emancipated ...

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #1614717
#90. It appears necessary to go back to first principles in search of the most simple truths, and to dispute with some prevailing prejudice every inch of ground.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #1652460
#91. Women ought to have representatives, instead of being arbitrarily governed without any direct share allowed them in the deliberations of government.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #1669139
#92. Women all want to be ladies, which is simply to have nothing to do, but listlessly to go they scarcely care where, for they cannot tell what.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #1690450
#93. A magic lamp now seemed to be suspended in Maria's prison, and fairy landscapes flitted round the gloomy walls, late so blank. Rushing from the depth of despair, on the seraph wing of hope, she found herself happy. - She was beloved, and every emotion was rapturous.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #1728974
#94. And having no fear of the devil before
my eyes, I venture to call this a suggestion of reason, instead of resting my weakness on the broad shoulders of the first seducer of my frail sex.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #1743171
#95. Good habits, imperceptibly fixed, are far preferable to the precepts of reason.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #1779608
#96. True happiness must arise from well-regulated affections, and an affection includes a duty.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #1795067
#97. For years I have endeavored to calm an impetuous tide
laboring to make my feelings take an orderly course
it was striving against the stream.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #1846535
#98. The absurd duty, too often inculcated, of obeying a parent only on account of his being a parent, shackles the mind, and prepares it for a slavish submission to any power but reason.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #1860783
#99. The most perfect education ... is such an exercise of the understanding as is best calculated to strengthen the body and form the heart. Or, in other words, to enable the individual to attain such habits of virtue as will render it independent.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #1863106
#100. Friendship and domestic happiness are continually praised; yet how little is there of either in the world, because it requires more cultivation of mind to keep awake affection, even in our own hearts, than the common run of people suppose.

Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes #1868349

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