ut of sympathy with us, and we find far more happiness with
the rawest youth who, though entirely ignorant, is at least on our
side--caring for the things for which we care. Capacity to share the
same intellectual work may be a very pleasant addition to marriage, but
it is no essential. What a man wants is that his wife shall be on his
side in his pursuits. A boy does not require that his mother shall be
able to play football with him, but he does require that she shall care
whether his side wins or loses. The wife who is a true mother to her
husband, in this sense, need not be concerned because she cannot, let us
say, follow his working out of a geometrical proposition. Let her be on
his side whether he fails or succeeds, thus playing the mother; and for
the rest, if she asks him what those funny marks mean, she can play the
daughter too, and hold his heart with both hands at once.

It is to be hoped that such arguments as these will persuade the reader
to assent to our rejection of the psychological grounds on which it is
proposed to abolish monogamy. We extend all the sympathy in the world to
those whose fortune has been unfortunate, and we admit that the ideal
does not always coincide with the real, but we deny that the supposed
argument against monogamy is based upon a sound understanding of human
nature, its needs and its unity in multiplicity.

If we are to stand by monogamy it behoves us to examine very carefully
certain of its present conditions which militate against the full
realization of its value for the individual and for the race. The
disproportion of the sexes we have already discussed, and it may here be
assumed that that grave obstacle to the success of monogamy is removed.
There remains the fact, probably on the whole a quite new fact of our
day, that under modern conditions a large proportion of women, whose
quality we must consider, are declining monogamy as at present
constituted.

Let it be granted that a certain number of these women are cranks,
aberrant in various directions, unfitted for any kind of marriage,
undesirable from the eugenic standpoint, and perhaps less often
declining to be married than failing of the opportunity. There remains
the fact that a large and probably increasing number of women are
nowadays being educated up to such a standard of ideals that, even
though their decision involves the sacrifice of motherhood, they cannot
consent to marriage under present conditions. It