ledge that offspring can be born only to prostitution
or mendicity. The realization of such hopes will console us under the
attacks upon our doctrines.'

It has been eagerly repeated by some, that the wish to limit offspring
arises most frequently from an inordinate desire of indulgence. We reply
to such, that they do not know the human heart, and that they do it
discredit. More frequently the wish springs from a love of children. The
parents seek to avoid having more than they can properly nourish and
educate. They do not wish to leave their sons and daughters in want.
'This,' says a writer in _The Nation_ (of New York), in an article on
this interesting subject,--'this is not the noblest motive of action, of
course, but there is something finely human about it.'

'Very much indeed is it to be wished,' says Dr. Edward Reich, after
reviewing the multitudinous evils which result to individuals and
society from a too rapid increase in families, 'that the function of
reproduction be placed under the dominion of the will.'

Men are very ready to find an excuse for self-indulgence; and if they
cannot get one anywhere else, they seek it in religion. They tell the
woman it is her duty to bear all the children she can. They refer her to
the sturdy, strong-limbed women of early times, to the peasant women of
northern Europe, who emigrate to America, and ask and expect their wives
to rival them in fecundity. Such do not reflect that they have been
brought up to light indoor employment, that their organization is more
nervous and frail, that they absolutely have not the stamina required
for many confinements.

Moreover, they presume too much in asking her to bear them. 'If a woman
has a right to decide on any question,' said a genial physician in the
Massachusetts Medical Society a few years since, 'it certainly is as to
how many children she shall bear.' 'Certainly,' say the editors of a
prominent medical journal, 'wives have a right to demand of their
husbands at least the same consideration which a breeder extends to his
stock.' 'Whenever it becomes unwise that the family should be
increased,' says Sismondi again, '_justice_ and _humanity_ require that
the husband should impose on himself the same restraint which is
submitted to by the unmarried.'

An eminent writer on medical statistics, Dr. Henry MacCormac, says: 'The
brute yields to the generative impulse when it is experienced. He is
troubled by no compunction about th