Final answer:
Mary Wollstonecraft emphasizes the role of virtue in enabling women to achieve rationality and human flourishing, advocating for educational reform that promotes virtue as essential for social progress and equity.
Step-by-step explanation:
The idea of virtue plays a pivotal role in Mary Wollstonecraft's arguments within her critical work A Vindication of the Rights of Woman. Wollstonecraft challenges the conventional views of her time by asserting that women are not inherently inferior to men, but rather deprived of virtue due to a lack of education. She argues that both men and women should be treated as rational beings capable of moral and intellectual development, insisting on a social order founded on reason and virtue. The philosopher connects virtue to human flourishing, suggesting that morality is based on virtues that enable individuals to develop meaningful relationships and actualize their potential. In this way, Wollstonecraft prescribes virtue as a means for women to become full participants in society, aligning with Enlightenment philosophers' pursuit of social reform through the cultivation of intelligence and virtue.