XC. But waiving these proofs, which proceed upon Aristotelic doctrines,
which are either false or uncertain, and which on this account, can
only be serviceable to the cause of the women, by way of retorting upon
those rigid partizans of Aristotle, who approve of all their master
has said: I say, waiving these proofs, let us proceed to enquire, if,
from the cause of the humidity in which a woman exceeds a man, there
can be deduced any objection to her intellectual aptitude. On this
ground, those commonly take their stand, who are desirous of proving
by physical arguments, the inferiority of feminine understanding; and
their reasoning seems to have an air of probability, because an excess
of humour, either of itself, or by means of the vapour it attracts, is
apt to retard the course of the animal spirits, by occupying in part,
the narrow passages through which these exceeding fine substances flow.
XCI. But with all this, the argument is evidently fallacious; for if
it was not, it would prove, not that the minds of women were less
discerning than those of men, but that they were more slow and dull of
comprehension than them, which is false; for most men allow, that in
point of quickness they have the advantage.
XCII. Further; many men, who are keen, ready, and profound, abound
with habitual defluxions and catarrhs, which are caused by a quantity
of excrementitious moisture collected in the most remote recesses
of the head, and within the very substance of the brain, as may be
seen in Riberius, where he treats of catarrhs. The excessive humidity
of the brain then, does not obstruct the ready or right use of the
understanding; and if an excrementitious moisture does not obstruct
it, much less can a natural one have that effect.
XCIII. And as a reason why a natural one does not hinder it, we may
add, that, according to the doctrine of Pliny, the brain of a man
is more humid than that of every other living creature: _Sed homo
portione maximum & humidissimum._ Lib. 11, Cap. 37. Nor is it credible,
that Nature should place in an organ destined for our most perfect
knowledge, a temperament, capable of obstructing, or making the
operations of our reason slow and defective. If I should be told, that,
notwithstanding this native humidity, in which the brain of man exceeds
that of a brute, it remains tempered in the exact proportion which is
best suited to the operations of reason, and that the humidity of the
brain of a woman exceeds that proportion; I answer, even supposing that
humidity, by means of its natural quality, does not obstruct, nobody
knows in what proportion, or to what degree, the brain, for the best
exercising its functions should be moist; and therefore it is vague to
say, there is a greater proportion of it in women than in men, or in
men than in women.
XCIV. There may be opposed however, to this doctrine of humidity, the
opinion of many, who affirm, that the humid and cloudy countries
produce heavy dull spirits; and, on the contrary, that in the bright
and clear countries, are born ingenious and sprightly ones. But be
those few or many who say this, they say it without more foundation,
than having imagined, the clouds of the horizon are translated to the
sphere of the brain; as if in rainy countries, the opacity of the
atmosphere was a dark shade, which obscured the soul, and that in
countries which are blessed with a serene sky, the greater splendor
of the day, would communicate greater clearness to the understanding.
They might, with more aptness and propriety, say, that in the regions
which are most bright and clear, the objects being more visible, they,
through the windows of the eyes, enter in such numbers, that they
distract the soul, and render it less fit for reflection and reasoning;
and hence it is, that, in the obscurity of the night, we find the
thread of our reason the least interrupted, and that we deduce our
conclusions with more firmness than in clear day-light.
XCV. Let those, who maintain humid regions to be ill-suited to the
production of subtile men, cast their eyes on the Venetians and the
Hollanders, who are some of the most able men in Europe: the first of
these, stole part of their territories from the fish; and the last
may be said to live in lakes and bogs. Even here in Spain, we have
an example of this sort in the Asturians, who, notwithstanding they
inhabit a province, the most beset with clouds, and the most subject
to rain, of any in the whole peninsula, are generally reputed for
subtile, ready, and expert people. But our wonder at this will lessen,
if we consider the beavers, who live almost continually in the water,
notwithstanding which, Nature has produced no brutes of so noble an
instinct, nor who approach so near to men, both in their love for them,
and in the imitation of their customs: for you may read in Conradus
Gesnero, that they take particular care of their aged parents, and they
have been seen to direct men in their navigation, and to assist them
in fishing; and there has such an attention been observed in them to
the dead, that they withdraw and conceal the carcasses of their defunct
species, at the hazard of their being devoured by other aquatic beasts.
XCVI. On the contrary, those birds, who the greatest part of their
time, breathe the most subtile pure air, and the most divested of
vapours, one while fleeting on the winds, and at other times placing
themselves on the tops of mountains, ought to be more sagacious than
terrestrial brutes; which is not the case.
XCVII. By the same mode of reasoning, the Egyptians should be the
keenest people in the world, because they dwell under the brightest and
most serene sky that is to be found in all the globe. There is scarce
a cloud passes over Egypt in the course of a year, and the land would
be totally barren, if it was not refreshed and fertilized by the waters
of the Nile; and although for some ages, antiquity venerated that
region as the seat of the sciences, which is manifest from Pythagoras,
Homer, Plato, and other Greek philosophers, having traveled thither to
improve themselves in philosophy and the mathematics; this does not
prove, that they were more subtile and ingenious than other mortals,
but rather, that the sciences had gone wandering about the earth, and
that sometimes they took their stations in one country, and at others
in another. The same thing may be said of the valley of Lima, the
inhabitants of which country do not know what rain is, the land being
fertilized by a light dew, assisted by a happy temperament of air,
which is neither hot nor cold; notwithstanding which, the natives are
not people of a delicate ingenuity, but rather the contrary, for the
Pizarras found them more easy to be subdued by a few stratagems, than
Cortez found the Mexicans, with all the arts he could employ, assisted
by the whole power of his arms.
XCVIII. I am not ignorant, that the inhabitants of Bœotia were
antiently looked upon, as a most rude, dull people, and that _Bœoticum
Ingenium_ and _Bœtica Sus_, were proverbial terms of contempt, and
used to express or denote, a heavy stupid person; and also, that this
stupidity was attributed to the gross atmosphere, loaded with vapour,
which prevails in that country; hence the expression of Horace in
one of his epistles: _Bœoticum in crasso jurares aëre natum._ But I
believe, and with some foundation, that the antients quoted did not
do that country justice; imputing the ignorance which proceeded from
want of application, to the want of capacity; and Bœotia’s lying on
the confines of Attica, where learning flourished, seems to strengthen
this opinion; for it is hardly probable, that within sight of a
province, which is the theatre of wisdom, you should view another,
which is a colony of ignorance and stupidity. On the other hand, it
is certain, that Bœotia has produced some geniuses of the first rate;
such as Pindar, the prince of Lyric Poets, and the great Plutarch,
who, in the opinion of lord Bacon, was full equal to the first men of
antiquity; and I suspect, that by looking back to the more early times
of antiquity, we shall find a period, in which the Bœotians, in their
culture of the arts and sciences, excelled, not only their neighbours,
but all the other nations of Europe; because Cadmus, when he came from
Phœnicia, was the first who introduced the letters of the alphabet into
Greece, and was the first person in Europe, who invented the art of
writing; and we learn from history, that he settled in Bœotia, where
he founded the city of Thebes. To this may be added, that in Bœotia
is found Mount Helicon, dedicated to the Muses, and from which they
derive their name of Heliconides; and that from this mountain, descends
the famous Aganippe fountain, consecrated to the same fictitious
deities, the water of which, they feign to have been the wine of the
poets, which enraptured and inspired them, and lighted up the fire of
enthusiasm in their brains. It seems as if all these fictions could
have no other origin, than poetry having in some former time flourished
in that region.
XCIX. But admitting the Bœotians by nature to be rude and stupid,
how can it be proved, that this is derived from the humidity of the
country, and not from some other hidden cause; especially, when we
see moist or damp countries, on which this stigma is not fixed? Let
humidity then, be acquitted of the false accusation which has been
raised against it, to wit, of being at war with, and an enemy to
ingenuity; and let it be settled, that from this principle, no proof
can be deduced to ascertain, that the women in point of understanding,
are inferior to the men.