Mary’s “trespass”—her insistence that women’s rights be included in a society founded on the basis of personal liberties—was one of her most important contributions to political philosophy and what would come to be known as feminism.

According to the culture of sentiment, the purity of her heart and spirit meant she stood outside—that is, above—the ordinary run of human beings. It was also true that being abandoned had two meanings: being left behind, but also being wild, or living outside the law.

instead of regarding his handiwork with pride, she had her young inventor be repelled by his creation, abandoning his “compleated man” in horror.

person might act with good intentions, but there could still be painful results.

She had been able to endure her contractions without terror because she understood the workings of her own body.

Rape was an occupational hazard of being a governess.

Those who are bold enough to advance before the age they live in, and to throw off, by the force of their own minds, the prejudices which the maturing reason of the world will in time disavow, must learn to brave censure. We ought not to be too anxious respecting the opinion of others.

“Dream that my little baby came to life again—that it had only been cold & that we rubbed it by the fire & it lived—I awake & find no baby—I think about the little thing all day.”

Twice as many people died as were born.