'Gentle shepherd, tell me why?'--

If the mode of election was what it ought to be, there would be no more
difficulty in women voting for a representative in Parliament than for
a director at the India House. The world will find out at some time
that the readiest way to secure justice on some points is to be just on
all:--that the whole is easier to accomplish than the part; and that,
whenever the camel is driven through the eye of the needle, it would be
simple folly and debility that would leave a hoof behind."

Why, says or sings Mr Bentham, should not women vote? It may seem
uncivil in us to turn a deaf ear to his Arcadian warblings. But we
submit, with great deference, that it is not OUR business to tell him
why. We fully agree with him that the principle of female suffrage is
not so palpably absurd that a chain of reasoning ought to be pronounced
unsound merely because it leads to female suffrage. We say that every
argument which tells in favour of the universal suffrage of the males
tells equally in favour of female suffrage. Mr Mill, however, wishes
to see all men vote, but says that it is unnecessary that women should
vote; and for making this distinction HE gives as a reason an assertion
which, in the first place, is not true, and which, in the next place,
would, if true, overset his whole theory of human nature; namely, that
the interest of the women is identical with that of the men. We side
with Mr Bentham, so far, at least, as this: that, when we join to drive
the camel through the needle, he shall go through hoof and all. We at
present desire to be excused from driving the camel. It is Mr Mill who
leaves the hoof behind. But we should think it uncourteous to reproach
him in the language which Mr Bentham, in the exercise of his paternal
authority over the sect, thinks himself entitled to employ.

"Another of their perverted ingenuities is, that 'they are rather
inclined to think,' that it would, on the whole, be for the interest of
the majority to plunder the rich; and if so, the Utilitarians will say
that the rich OUGHT to be plundered. On which it is sufficient to reply,
that for the majority to plunder the rich would amount to a declaration
that nobody should be rich; which, as all men wish to be rich, would
involve a suicide of hope. And as nobody has shown a fragment of reason
why such a proceeding should be for the general happiness, it does
not follow that the 'Utilitarians' would recommend