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Women need not take up with mean things, since (if they are not wanting to themselves) they are capable of the best.

Mary Astell

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Mary Astell
Age: 64 †
Born: 1666
Born: November 12
Died: 1731
Died: May 11
Feminist
Philosopher
Writer
Newcastle
Take
Mean
Needs
Wanting
Things
Capable
Since
Women
Best
Need

More quotes by Mary Astell

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If all men are born free, why is it that all women are born slaves?
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Every Body has so good an Opinion of their own Understanding as to think their own way the best.
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The design of Rhetoric is to remove those Prejudices that lie in the way of Truth, to Reduce the Passions to the Government of Reasons to place our Subject in a Right Light, and excite our Hearers to a due consideration of it.
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A woman indeed can't properly be said to choose, all that is allowed her, is to refuse or accept what is offered.
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How can a Man respect his Wife when he has a contemptible Opinion of her and her Sex?
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friendship is a virtue which comprehends all the rest none being fit for this, who is not adorned with every other virtue.
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Tis very great pity that they who are so apt to over-rate themselves in smaller matters, shou'd, where it most concerns them to know, and stand upon their Value, be so insensible of their own worth.
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How can you be content to be in the world like tulips in a garden, to make a fine show, and be good for nothing.
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If God had not intended that Women shou'd use their Reason, He wou'd not have given them any, 'for He does nothing in vain.
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If a Woman can neither Love nor Honour, she does ill in promising to Obey.
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Hitherto I have courted Truth with a kind of Romantick Passion, in spite of all Difficulties and Discouragements: for knowledge is thought so unnecessary an Accomplishment for a Woman, that few will give themselves the Trouble to assist us in the Attainment of it.
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The Steps to Folly as well as Sin are gradual, and almost imperceptible, and when we are once on the Decline, we go down without taking notice on't.
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Unhappy is that Grandeur which makes us too great to be good and that Wit which sets us at a distance from true Wisdom.
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Whilst our Hearts are violently set upon any thing, there is no convincing us that we shall ever be of another Mind.
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Women are from their very infancy debarred those advantages with the want of which they are aftewards reproached, and nursed up in those vices which will hereafter be upbraided to them. So partial are men as to expect bricks when they afford no straw.
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It is not the Head but the Heart that is the Seat of Atheism.
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Women are from their very infancy debarred those Advantages with the want of which they are afterwards reproached.
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. . . he who only or chiefly chose for Beauty, will in a little Time find the same Reason for another Choice.
Mary Astell
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Every one knows, that the mind will not be kept from contemplating what it loves in the midst of crowds and business. Hence come those frequent absences, so observable in conversation for whilst the body is confined to present company, the mind is flown to that which it delights in.
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We may not commit a lesser Sin under pretence to avoid a greater, but we may, nay we ought to endure the greatest Pain and Grief rather than commit the least Sin.
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