The mutual duties of the two sexes are not, and cannot be, equally binding on both.  Women do wrong to complain of the inequality of man-made laws; this inequality is not of man’s making, or at any rate it is not the result of mere prejudice, but of reason.  She to whom nature has entrusted the care of the children must hold herself responsible for them to their father.  No doubt every breach of faith is wrong, and every faithless husband, who robs his wife of the sole reward of the stern duties of her sex, is cruel and unjust; but the faithless wife is worse; she destroys the family and breaks the bonds of nature; when she gives her husband children who are not his own, she is false both to him and them, her crime is not infidelity but treason.  To my mind, it is the source of dissension and of crime of every kind.  Can any position be more wretched than that of the unhappy father who, when he clasps his child to his breast, is haunted by the suspicion that this is the child of another, the badge of his own dishonour, a thief who is robbing his own children of their inheritance.  Under such circumstances the family is little more than a group of secret enemies, armed against each other by a guilty woman, who compels them to pretend to love one another.

Thus it is not enough that a wife should be faithful; her husband, along with his friends and neighbours, must believe in her fidelity; she must be modest, devoted, retiring; she should have the witness not only of a good conscience, but of a good reputation.  In a word, if a father must love his children, he must be able to respect their mother.  For these reasons it is not enough that the woman should be chaste, she must preserve her reputation and her good name.  From these principles there arises not only a moral difference between the sexes, but also a fresh motive for duty and propriety, which prescribes to women in particular the most scrupulous attention to their conduct, their manners, their behaviour.  Vague assertions as to the equality of the sexes and the similarity of their duties are only empty words; they are no answer to my argument.

It is a poor sort of logic to quote isolated exceptions against laws so firmly established.  Women, you say, are not always bearing children.  Granted; yet that is their proper business.  Because there are a hundred or so of large towns in the world where women live licentiously and have few children, will you maintain that it is their business to have few children?  And what would become of your towns if the remote country districts, with their simpler and purer women, did not make up for the barrenness of your fine ladies?  There are plenty of country places where women with only four or five children are reckoned unfruitful.  In conclusion, although here and there a woman may have few children, what difference does it make? [Footnote:  Without this the race would necessarily diminish; all things considered, for its preservation each woman ought to have about four children, for about half the children born die before they can become parents, and two must survive to replace the father and mother.  See whether the towns will supply them?] Is it any the less a woman’s business to be a mother?  And to not the general laws of nature and morality make provision for this state of things?