ually much more precocious
than men, physically as well as psychically (see _ante_ p. 35).
The difference is about five years. This difference has been
virtually recognized for thousands of years, in the ancient
belief that the age of election for procreation is about twenty,
or less, for women, but about twenty-five for men; and it has
more lately been affirmed by the discovery that, while the male
is never capable of generation before thirteen, the female may,
in occasional instances, become pregnant at eight. (Some of the
recorded examples are quoted by Kisch.) In part, also, there is
an objection to the assumption of responsibilities so serious as
those of motherhood by a young girl, and there is the very
reasonable feeling that the obligations of a permanent marriage
tie ought not to be undertaken at an early age. On the other
hand, apart from the physical advantages, as regards both mother
and infant, on the side of early pregnancies, it is an advantage
for the child to have a young mother, who can devote herself
sympathetically and unreservedly to its interests, instead of
presenting the pathetic spectacle we so often witness in the
middle-aged woman who turns to motherhood when her youth and
mental flexibility are gone, and her habits and tastes have
settled into other grooves; it has sometimes been a great
blessing even to the very greatest men, like Goethe, to have had
a youthful mother. It would also, in many cases, be a great
advantage for the woman herself if she could bring her
procreative life to an end well before the age of twenty-five, so
that she could then, unhampered by child-bearing and mature in
experience, be free to enter on such wider activities in the
world as she might be fitted for.

Such an arrangement of the procreative life of women would,
obviously, only be a variation, and would probably be unsuited
for the majority. Every case must be judged on its own merits.
The best age for procreation will probably continue to be
regarded as being, for most women, around the age of twenty. But
at a time like the present, when there is an unfortunate
tendency for motherhood to be unduly delayed, it becomes
necessary to insist on the advantages, in many cases, of early
motherhood.

There are other conditions favorable or unfavorable to procreation whic