Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes About Mind

A Vindication of the Rights of Men, opening letter to Edmund Burke, second edition (1790); this sentence follows Wollstonecraft’s refusal to disguise her sentiments behind courtly politeness.

A Vindication of the Rights of Woman, Introduction, Project Gutenberg #3420. The frozen quotation 'I wish to persuade women to endeavour to acquire strength, both of mind and body' is a clause from a longer sentence beginning 'I earnestly wish to point out...' and continuing through Wollstonecraft's criticism of delicacy and weakness as feminine ideals. It remains eighteenth-century feminist political-moral argument rather than a modern clinical or physiological prescription.

A Vindication of the Rights of Woman; Wollstonecraft argues that deliberately narrowing women’s education preserves dependence and obedience.

A Vindication of the Rights of Woman; Wollstonecraft explicitly connects independence of character with the exercise of understanding.

A Vindication of the Rights of Woman; the statement immediately precedes Wollstonecraft’s insistence on reason rather than opinion as authority.

Letters Written During a Short Residence in Sweden, Norway, and Denmark, Letter VII; represented Cassell & Company 1889 text in Project Gutenberg #3529. “The contemplation of noble ruins produces a melancholy that exalts the mind” occurs during Wollstonecraft’s visit to a church recess containing long-preserved bodies and her reflections on death, ruins, historical change and mortality. It remains Romantic-era reflective prose rather than a modern psychological finding about melancholy.

Letters Written During a Short Residence in Sweden, Norway, and Denmark, Letter IX; represented Cassell & Company 1889 text in Project Gutenberg #3529. The frozen catalog reads “What a long time it requires to know ourselves, and yet every one has more of this knowledge than he is willing to own,” while the represented witness reads “What a long time it requires to know ourselves; and yet almost every one has more of this knowledge than he is willing to own, even to himself.” This collection retains its legacy shortened wording and explicitly records the omitted “almost” / closing phrase rather than silently rewriting it. Wollstonecraft is reflecting on her own solitude, experience and knowledge of the heart.

Thoughts on the Education of Daughters (1787), “MORAL DISCIPLINE,” beginning on printed page 22, Project Gutenberg #67466. “I wish them to be taught to think” follows Wollstonecraft’s recommendation that children compare similar and different ideas; the sentence continues into the next printed page and remains historical educational reform argument.

Thoughts on the Education of Daughters (1787), “READING,” printed page 49, Project Gutenberg #67466. “Judicious books enlarge the mind and improve the heart” appears in Wollstonecraft’s case for carefully chosen reading that joins intellectual cultivation with moral formation; the passage remains historical educational and conduct writing.

Thoughts on the Education of Daughters (1787), “THE BENEFITS WHICH ARISE FROM DISAPPOINTMENTS,” printed page 111, Project Gutenberg #67466. Wollstonecraft says reflection forms habits and fixes principles while opening a religious-moral discussion of disappointment, self-examination and character.