ABSTRACT
“The depravity of human nature” is one of the most convenient phrases that was ever invented as an excuse for indolence or vice. “The depravity of human nature” is a common bank, from which legislators, and rulers, and masters, and fathers, have in all ages drawn ample excuses for the misery of those entrusted to their care, or rather for their own negligence or errors. The condition of the women is one of the most remarkable circumstances in the manners of nations, and one of the most decisive criterions of the stage of society at which they have arrived. Among rude people, the women are generally degraded; among civilized people they are exalted. In the barbarian, the passion of sex is a brutal impulse, which infuses no tenderness; and man's undisciplined nature leads him to abuse his power over every creature that is weaker than himself.
