Especially in two respects has woman restricted the discussion.

She has placed her taboo upon all generalisations about women, taking
exception to these on the threefold ground that there would be no
generalisations which would hold true of all women; that
generalisations when reached possess no practical utility; and that
the element of sex does not leave upon women any general imprint such
as could properly be brought up in connexion with the question of
admitting them to the electorate.

Woman has further stifled discussion by placing her taboo upon
anything seriously unflattering being said about her in public.

I would suggest, and would propose here myself to act upon the
suggestion, that, in connexion with the discussion of woman's
suffrage, these restrictions should be laid aside.

In connexion with the setting aside of the restriction upon
generalising, I may perhaps profitably point out that all
generalisations, and not only generalisations which relate to women,
are _ex hypothesi [by hypothesis]_ subject to individual exceptions.
(It is to generalisations that the proverb that "the exception proves
the rule" really applies.) I may further point out that practically
every decision which we take in ordinary life, and all legislative
action without exception, is based upon generalisations; and again,
that the question of the suffrage, and with it the larger question as
to the proper sphere of woman, finally turns upon the question as to
what imprint woman's sexual system leaves upon her physical frame,
character, and intellect: in more technical terms, it turns upon the