 Broad’s interpretation captures Poulain’s egalitarian intentions and an account built on the independence of the will has the obvious advantage that even if there would be empirically detectable differences in how women and men are influenced by their bodies, they may share an equal freedom of will to assent or dissent to their passions as well as imaginings (see also Reuter 2019: 49–51). The philosophical problem with this account is that it leaves Poulain’s position open to the objections raised most prominently by Elisabeth of Bohemia in her correspondence with Descartes. On 22 June 1645 she writes: