virtue on, yet Wollstonecraft feels that is exactly what was “insisted upon by thewriters who have most vehemently argued in favor of the superiority of man”(Ferguson 7). Women of that time were labeled as weak, and althoughWollstonecraft writes that this description may be accurate, she feels it is onlybecause of lack of education for females (Wollstonecraft 104). She believes, as is written in her book, that education is essential for women to contribute to societyand to raise intelligent children. She asks her reader a poignant question: “ can[these women] be expected to govern a family with judgment, or take care of thepoor babes whom they bring into the world?” (Wollstonecraft 104). How couldwomen who were not allowed education and were frowned upon by society whenvoicing opinions or even discussing knowledgeable topics be able to raise a childand give them any type of sense? The mother is equally as important as a father; ittakes two make a child, and in eighteenth century England, it takes two to raise it. From birth a child has a natural attraction to his mother. If women were so poorly looked upon, then why were they chosen to raise the future of the world? Knowing that this seemed highly unlikely, Wollstonecraft, simply put, wanted females to be taught to think. Her ideas and views were most certainly radical and bizarre for her time. However, her work did allow the feminist movement to begin. Author TerriBittner writes that A Vindication of the Rights of Women was “important becauseit turned the idea of suffrage into a cause” (Bittner 2). Many writers agree that shewas too far ahead of her time for the achievement of equal rights for women, butnevertheless she did receive many supporters. Author Mary Hays praisesWollstonecraft in her book Letters and Essays, admiring the “virtues and talents” (Ferguson 72) of her book. Hays later on extolled ...
