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The sanctity of womanhood is incompatible with social liberty and social claims; and for a woman emancipation means corruption.

— Honoré de Balzac A Woman of Thirty (1842)

La sainteté des femmes est inconciliable avec les devoirs et les libertés du monde. Emanciper les femmes, c'est les corrompre.

Original text (French)

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Notes from Wikiquote

Ch. III: At Thirty Years

Topics

Women

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Attribution

Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Honoré de Balzac (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.