THE NEGLECTED CANON: NINE WOMEN PHILOSOPHERS FIRST TO THE TWENTIETH CENTURY The Neglected Canon: Nine Women Philosophers First to the Twentieth Century Edited by Therese Boos Dykeman Philosophy Dept., Fairfield University, Fairfield, U.S.A. SPRINGER-SCIENCE+BUSINESS MEDIA, B.V. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data ISBN 978-90-481-5314-5 ISBN 978-94-017-3400-4 (eBook) DOI 10.1007/978-94-017-3400-4 Printed on acid~free paper All Rights Reserved © 1999 Springer Science+ Business Media Dordrecht Originally published by Kluwer Academic Publishers in 1999 No part of the material protected by this copyright notice may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission from the copyright owner. v Dedicated to my family of choice and fortune, John, Andria, and Kristen, and in memory of Dee Wegman "Minerva teach me all thy days to tell" Atheism 1767 Phillis Wheatley Vll Contents Foreword ix Preface XI Acknowledgments X Ill Introduction XV First Century, C. E. 1 I. Pan Chao (c.45/51-114/120) 5 Lessons for Women 13 Bibliography 29 Twelfth Century 31 II. He/oise(1100-1163) 39 Letters of Heloise to Abelard 51 Bibliography 69 Fourteenth Century: Before and After 73 III. Marie le Jars de Gournay (1565-1645) 81 The Equality of Men and Women 89 Complaints of Women 100 Bibliography 105 Seventeenth Century 109 IV. Anna Maria van Schurman (1607-1679) 115 The Learned Maid 123 Bibliography 139 V. Mary Astell (1666-1731) 143 A Serious Proposal 151 Bibliography 163 VI. Sor Juana Jnes de Ia Cruz 1648-1695) 167 First Dream 175 Bibliography 203 Eighteenth Century 207 VII. Judith Sargent Murray ( 1751-1820) 215 On the Equality of the Sexes 225 Observations on Female Abilities 233 Bibliography 263 viii Contents Nineteenth Century 269 VIII. Frances Wright ( 1795-1852) 277 The Nature of Knowledge 285 Of Free Inquiry 301 Bibliography 315 IX. Antoinette Brown Blackwell 321 Sex and Evolution 331 Bibliography 357 Conclusion 361 Index 363 ix Foreword When down from the moon stepped the goddess of the night, she bid Minerva/Athene come to her. "Minerva/Athene," she said, "you sprang fully formed from the head of your father. Now all the daughters of mankind think they, too, are as rootless as you. Tonight I bid you dance, join the circle round that tree glistening with the clarity of wisdom. Mother Natura1 and Lady Philosophia, hands together, already have begun the promenade of myth and allegory." Still in the garb of gold and white stone, Minerva/A thene did as she was bid and danced till dawn. Then in new light, she found herself suddenly a budding flower on a tall branch, and even more swiftly a crystalline fruit, rivaling the morning sun, refracting the light. Behold, she had grown roots, difficult to discover down in the dark of history, deep in the solid knowledge of earth. And the daughters of humankind saw and reveled in their roots. This is the story of this book, a history, long and diverse, of women thinkers and their thought. It will become a legacy for all who study it, a legacy that Heloi"se, Marie de Gournay, Sor Juana Ines de Ia Cruz, and Judith Sargent Murray among many women philosophers assured by composing lists of the names of women little acknowledged century after century. While the Hannah Arendt's, Susanne K. Langer's, and all the present day women philosophers are deservedly making their way onto the library shelves, we still see the shelves of philosophy with but few women's texts. So, until, in the midst of the many male thinkers, there are included those followers of Minerva/Athene who have given us our roots, women and men will little acknowledge the reality of the efforts of women's minds. Poets prove the long and diverse legacy of women and the love of wisdom: From Sumeria Enheduanna (c. 2300 B.C.E.) Inanna's prayer: "He gave me truth"; 1 In the Middle Ages, some philosophers, as Peter Dronke has pointed out, gave "Mother Nature" a philosophical name conceptualizing her as not only the caretaker of the cosmos but co~reator. "Lady Philosophy," unusually animated by Boethius, was a common image of a woman teacher of wisdom in the Middle Ages. x Forword From Arabia/Ethiopia Makeda, Queen of Sheba (c.IOOO B.C.E.) "Wisdom is sweeter than honey ... "; From India Sumangalamata, Therigatha (6th c. BC. .E.) "Meditating thus, I am happy, I am serene." This text proves women's long pursuit of wisdom. While you may fmd the mentioning of so many philosophers in the historical perspectives bewildering, my rationale is that the many names and theories will appeal to a wide range of interests and offer possibilities for further investigation on women philosophers. The author xi Preface From fragments and completed writings we have learned that thinking women from antiquity forward have chafed under mental restrictions placed upon them, and that among these women thinkers, there have always been philosophers. This text provides philosophy of nine women from China to modem Europe and America who formulated feminist philosophy as they advanced their individual philosophical arguments-metaphysics to political theory. This text can be taught as a course on women philosophers, or as a supplement to such courses in philosophy as epistemology or feminism. The text follows in this order: a brief context of the philosophy of the particular time period, a chronology, an introduction to the philosopher and her work, the work itself and a bibliography. This format is generally repeated for each philosopher, first to the twentieth centuries. The historical contexts establish pertinent philosophical milieus for the anthologized works. Each history focuses on an additional woman to compare to the philosopher whose works are presented in the text: Hildegard the Medieval, Christine de Pisan the early Renaissance, Anne Bradstreet seventeenth century, Mercy Otis Warren eighteenth century, and Ednah Dow Cheney nineteenth. These additional philosophers and the bibliographies for the nine anthologized philosophers, provide the student with materials for research. It is because the nine philosophers are little known, or little known as philosophers, that a chronology and a biography as well as analysis of their philosophical orientation precede their work or works. But it is also that these lives inform at least the feminism in the works if not the other philosophical issues.