What Mary Wollstonecraft thinks about happiness
English moral and political philosopher (1759 to 1797); author of A Vindication of the Rights of Men (1790) and A Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1792).
Mary Wollstonecraft did not write this page.
We collected these quotes from things they published elsewhere, and every quote links to where it was said. They have no account here and have not endorsed this site. Quotes are word for word; the short line under each one is our own restatement, not their wording. Their own site. Is this you? Claim it or ask us to remove it. Or tell us what is wrong here.
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Only Mary Wollstonecraft on happiness. See everyone on happiness
3 dated positions, c. 1787 to c. 1792, in their own words. Our reading of what Mary Wollstonecraft has said — not written or endorsed by them.
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Their wordsIndependence I have long considered as the grand blessing of life, the basis of every virtue; and independence I will ever secure by contracting my wants, though I were to live on a barren heath.
↗A Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1792)gutenberg.org All 20 from this book
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Our readingWomen, like oppressed men, are degraded by preferring present pleasure to the struggle for freedom
Their wordsWomen, I argue from analogy, are degraded by the same propensity to enjoy the present moment; and, at last, despise the freedom which they have not sufficient virtue to struggle to attain.
↗A Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1792)gutenberg.org All 20 from this book
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Their wordsBut yet a rigid style of behaviour is by no means to be adopted; on the contrary, I wish to remark, that it is only in the years of childhood that the happiness of a human being depends entirely on others—and to embitter those years by needless restraint is cruel.
↗Thoughts on the Education of Daughters (1787)gutenberg.org All 18 from this book