Quote by Juan Luis Vives: “The education of women is a matter that concerns the whole of society.”

When women are educated, it does not only benefit them individually — it changes everything around them. They raise children differently, engage in community differently, and participate in civic life differently. Vives was making this argument in 1523, when it was genuinely radical.

Vives published Instruction of a Christian Woman in 1523, dedicated to Catherine of Aragon for the education of Princess Mary. It was one of the most widely read books on women's education in the sixteenth century, translated across Europe, even as it also reflected some of the period's conservative assumptions.

Spanish-born Renaissance humanist philosopher who lived and worked in the Low Countries and England. His work on psychology, education, and poor relief was ahead of its time, and his Instruction of a Christian Woman was among the first sustained arguments for women's education.