t is good for one must therefore be good for another. Now, in
the first place, as Fitzjames urges, there is no presumption in favour
of this hypothesis; and, in the next place, it is obviously untrue in
some cases. Differences of age, for example, must be taken into account
unless we accept the most monstrous conclusions. How does this apply to
the case of sex? Mill held that the difference in the law was due simply
to the superiority of men to women in physical strength. Fitzjames
replies that men are stronger throughout, stronger in body, in nerve and
muscle, in mind and character. To neglect this fact would be silly; but
if we admit it, we must admit its relevance to legislation. Marriage,
for example, is one of the cases with which law and morality are both
compelled to deal. Now the marriage contract necessarily involves the
subordination of the weaker to the stronger. This, says Fitzjames, is as
clearly demonstrable as a proposition of Euclid.[146] For, either the
contract must be dissoluble at will or the rule must be given to one,
and if to one, then, as every one admits, to the husband. We must then
choose between entire freedom of divorce and the subordination of the
wife. If two people are indissolubly connected and differ in opinions,
one must give way. The wife, thinks Fitzjames, should give way as the
seaman should give way to his captain; and to regard this as humiliating
is a mark not of spirit but of a 'base, unworthy, mutinous
disposition.'[147]

If, to avoid this, you made marriage dissoluble, you would really make
women the slaves of their husbands. In nine cases out of ten, the man is
the most independent, and could therefore tyrannise by the threat of
dismissing his wife. By trying to forbid coercion, you do not really
suppress it, but make its action arbitrary.

He apologises to a lady in a letter referring to another controversy
upon the same subject in which he had used rather strong language about
masculine 'superiority.' 'When a beast is stirred up,' he says, 'he
roars rather too loud,' and 'this particular beast loves and honours and
worships women more than he can express, and owes most of the happiness
of his life to them.' By 'superior' he only meant 'stronger'; and he
only urges a 'division of labour,' and a correspondence between laws and
facts. This was, I think, strictly true, and applies to other parts of
his book. Partly from pugnacity and partly from contempt of
sentimentalism, he