Philosophy not an improper Study for the Female Sex; many of them very eminent for their great Progress in the Sciences; particularly _Hypatia_, who excelled all the Philosophers of her Time.
That this Notion is a vulgar Prejudice, the vast Number of Ladies, who have in every Age distinguish’d themselves by their Professions or Performances in Learning, furnishes an unanswerable Argument. Whole Volumes have been written, containing nothing else but the Lives of such Women, as became eminent in all Kinds of Literature, especially in Philosophy; which, as it is the highest Perfection, so it demands the utmost Effort of human Nature. But leaving those Heroines to the Search of the Curious, I shall confine myself at present to one Object worthy all Admiration; in doing Justice to whom, I may be deemed to write the Panegyric of the whole Sex. We have the unanimous Consent of _Synesius_, _Socrates_, and _Philostorgius_, her Contemporaries; as likewise of _Damascius_, _Nicephorus Gregoras_, _Nicephorus Callistus_, _Photius_, _Suidas_, _Hesychius Illustris_, and others, touching the prodigious Learning and other excellent Accomplishments of _Hypatia_. What is still a greater Proof of the Fact, no one Person, or through Ignorance or through Envy, has ever as much as insinuated the contrary. _Socrates_, the Ecclesiastical Historian, an unsuspected Witness, says, That _she arrived to such a Pitch of Learning, as very far to exceed all the Philosophers of her time_; to which _Nicephorus_, also an Ecclesiastical Historian, adds, _Those of other Times_. _Philostorgius_ affirms, That _she was much superior to her Father and Master _Theon_, in what regards Astronomy_.