Among such of the primitive modifications of the corporeal frame as may
appear to influence the quantum and bias of sensibility, the most
obvious and conspicuous are those which constitute the sex. In
point of quantity, the sensibility of the female sex appears in general
to be greater than that of the male. The health of the female is more
delicate than that of the male: in point of strength and hardiness of
body, in point of quantity and quality of knowledge, in point of
strength of intellectual powers, and firmness of mind, she is commonly
inferior: moral, religious, sympathetic, and antipathetic sensibility
are commonly stronger in her than in the male. The quality of her
knowledge, and the bent of her inclinations, are commonly in many
respects different. Her moral biases are also, in certain respects,
remarkably different: chastity, modesty, and delicacy, for instance, are
prized more than courage in a woman: courage, more than any of those
qualities, in a man. The religious biases in the two sexes are not apt
to be remarkably different; except that the female is rather more
inclined than the male to superstition; that is, to observances not
dictated by the principle of utility; a difference that may be pretty
well accounted for by some of the before-mentioned circumstances. Her
sympathetic biases are in many respects different: for her own offspring
all their lives long, and for children in general while young, her
affection is commonly stronger than that of the male. Her affections are
apt to be less enlarged: seldom expanding themselves so much as to take
in the welfare of her country in general, much less that of mankind, or
the whole sensitive creation: seldom embracing any extensive class or
division, even of her own countrymen, unless it be in virtue of her
sympathy for some particular individuals that belong to it. In general,
her antipathetic, as well as sympathetic biases, are apt to be less
conformable to the principle of utility than those of the male; owing
chiefly to some deficiency in point of knowledge, discernment, and
comprehension. Her habitual occupations of the amusing kind are apt to
be in many respects different from those of the male. With regard to her
connexions in the way of sympathy, there can be no difference. In point
of pecuniary circumstances, according to the customs of perhaps all
countries, she is in general less independent.
(Jeremy Bentham, An Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation, ed. J. H. Burns and H. L. A. Hart, in The Collected Works of Jeremy Bentham, ed. F. Rosen and Philip Schofield [Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1996], chap. 6, sec. 35, pp. 64-5 [italics in original] [book first published in 1789])
Note from KBJ: I can't think of a single female utilitarian, past or present. Bentham explains why.
Keith Burgess-Jackson, J.D., Ph.D. 