love-poetry in existence (except, perhaps, the "Sonnets from the
Portuguese") has not been written by men; whether the song which
embodies the ideal of pure and tender passion--Adelaida--was written by
_Frau_ Beethoven; whether it was the Fornarina, or Raphael, who painted
the Sistine Madonna. Nay, we have known one such heretic go so far as to
lay his hands upon the ark itself, so to speak, and to defend the
startling paradox that, even in physical beauty, man is the superior. He
admitted, indeed, that there was a brief period of early youth when it
might be hard to say whether the prize should be awarded to the graceful
undulations of the female figure, or the perfect balance and supple
vigour of the male frame. But while our new Paris might hesitate between
the youthful Bacchus and the Venus emerging from the foam, he averred
that, when Venus and Bacchus had reached thirty, the point no longer
admitted of a doubt; the male form having then attained its greatest
nobility, while the female is far gone in decadence; and that, at this
epoch, womanly beauty, so far as it is independent of grace or
expression, is a question of drapery and accessories.

Supposing, however, that all these arguments have a certain foundation;
admitting for a moment, that they are comparable to those by which the
inferiority of the negro to the white man may be demonstrated, are they
of any value as against woman-emancipation? Do they afford us the
smallest ground for refusing to educate women as well as men--to give
women the same civil and political rights as men? No mistake is so
commonly made by clever people as that of assuming a cause to be had
because the arguments of its supporters are, to a great extent,
nonsensical. And we conceive that those who may laugh at the arguments
of the extreme philogynists, may yet feel bound to work heart and soul
towards the attainment of their practical ends.