No woman should say, 'I am but a woman!' But a woman! What more can…

You have a change that hasn’t been saved yet. Clicking out of the box saves it — closing now throws that change away.

No woman should say, 'I am but a woman!' But a woman! What more can… — Maria Mitchell · Smartyfair

No woman should say, 'I am but a woman!' But a woman! What more can you ask to be?

Source found

In plain words

Mitchell told women never to say 'I am only a woman'. Being a woman was already something to be proud of.

Look up a word

How sure this is: 95% sureThese words were traced back to where they first appeared. That source is listed below.
What turned up: Maria Mitchell: Life, Letters, and Journals (comp. Phebe Mitchell Kendall, 1896) — Project Gutenberg #10202, dated 1874 in her own notes, from her Vassar teaching years.
Work: Maria Mitchell: Life, Letters, and Journals (comp. Phebe Mitchell Kendall, 1896) — Project Gutenberg #10202
Occasion: 1874 · Vassar College · from her Vassar teaching notes on women and self-worth
Sources checked: gutenberg.orgChecked using claude-sonnet-5, 21 August 2026Ch. IX, marked '[1874.]' in the text — read in full: opens her passage on women and self-worth; the sentences that follow reinforce it, none reverse it.