y; men are better in some things, women are better in
others; if they have a position, their relative superiority in certain
things determines it. How else should it be determined?

If you say by religion, he laughs, and asks what religion has to do with
such things? Religion is a culture of the soul; it is not concerned with
the relationship of men and women. If you say by law, he says that law
has no more to do with it than religion. In the eye of the law both are
alike. 'You wouldn't have one law for a man and another for a woman?' he
asks.

In the life of the Buddha nothing is said upon the subject. The great
teacher never committed himself to an opinion as to whether men or women
were the highest. He had men disciples, he had women disciples; he
honoured both. Nowhere in any of his sayings can anything be found to
show that he made any difference between them. That monks should be
careful and avoid intercourse with women is merely the counterpart of
the order that nuns should be careful in their intercourse with men.
That man's greatest attraction is woman does not infer wickedness in
woman; that woman's greatest attraction is man does not show that man is
a devil. Wickedness is a thing of your own heart. If he could be sure
that his desire towards women was dead, a monk might see them as much as
he liked. The desire is the enemy, not the woman; therefore a woman is
not damned because by her man is often tempted to evil; therefore a
woman is not praised because by her a man may be led to better thoughts.
She is but the outer and unconscious influence.

If, for instance, you cannot see a precipice without wishing to throw
yourself down, you blame not the precipice, but your giddiness; and if
you are wise you avoid precipices in future. You do not rail against
steep places because you have a bad circulation. So it is with women:
you should not contemn women because they rouse a devil in man.

And it is the same with man. Men and women are alike subject to the
eternal laws. And they are alike subject to the laws of man; in no
material points, hardly even in minor points, does the law discriminate
against women.

The law as regards marriage and inheritance and divorce will come each
in its own place. It is curiously the same both for the man and the
woman.

The criminal law was the same for both; I have tried to find any
difference, and this is all I have found: A woman's life was less
valuable than a man's. The