Motherhood and the Relationships of the Sexes
The Age     of Mother-Power_—This work a necessary part of my present     inquiry—Re-statement of my own views—An attempt to group the     matter to be considered—The early period in which man developed     from his ape-like ancestors—Parenthood more fixed, fewer     experiments—The probable conditions of the primordial human     family—Customs of brute male-ownership—This the pre-matriarchal     stage of the family—Progress—The second stage—The growth     of the communal clan—The increasing influence of the     women—Reasons why this view may be accepted—Mother-descent and     mother-rights—The importance of this early matriarchate—The     maternal form of marriage—Visiting husbands—Communal dwelling     houses—Contrast between the customs of the patriarchal     individual family and the maternal communal clan—The power of     the wife and the mother—The alien position of the husband and     father—The assertion of the male force in the person of the     woman’s brother—The communal clan a transitional stage—The     re-establishment of the individual patriarchal family—The     fixing of paternity and the rise of the father’s power—Lessons     to be learnt from this past history of the family.