John Stuart Mill: A Criticism with Personal Recollections

I;j ON THE SUBJECTION OF WOMEN. 1849-1872.
the beginning of 1868, declared, as he says, his whole mind on
the subject of Ireland chiefly as regarded the Land and is
couched in very strong language indeed. He believed that this
pamphlet helped to determine Mr. Gladstone to commence his
Irish Legislation with the Church, leaving the Land to a later
operation.
The year 1869, his first year of release, saw the publication
of his last book The Subjection of Women, together with the
two first articles in his fourth volume of Dissertations
"
"
Endowments," and Labour and its claims," a review of Mr.
Thornton s work on that subject.
The volume on the Subjection of Women, he tells us, was first
written in 1861. It was, he says, a joint production ; portions
were written by Miss Taylor, while his share was the result of
innumerable conversations and discussions with his wife. How
ever the merits be partitioned, it is a book of very marked
character. It is the most sustained exposition of Mill s life-long
theme the abuses of power. The extent of the illustration
and the emphasis of the language render it the best extant
homily on the evils of subjection in general ;
while the same
arts are maintained in dealing with the application to the dis
abilities of women. This case, which of all others most engaged
his feelings, is, I think, the one instance where he may be
charged with overstraining. In discussing political freedom at
large, he is always sufficiently alive to the necessities of govern
ment ; in the present question, he leads us to suppose that the
relations of men and women between themselves may work
upon a purely voluntary principle. He abstains here and else
where from advocating divorce pure and simple, because of
the complications attending the : question while he does
not show what fe the remedy when a man and a woman,
united by the marriage bond, are unable to co-operate as equal
partners.
His handling of the mental equality of the sexes is, to my