What a Young Wife Ought to Know

by Emma F. Angell Drake

6. What to deny one’s self, that health may be preserved and the temper kept sweet.

7. As a part of the great human family, what is one’s responsibility to herself, to her family, to the best use of her time, and the generation which shall come after her?

8. Is reproduction a multiplying of one’s self; and if so, is she willing that herself, just as she is, should be reproduced.

9. What faults and failings has she, that she would not like to entail upon her offspring?

10. A thorough knowledge and understanding of the reproductive system.

11. Hereditary influences, and her moral responsibility in the inheritance of the generations to follow her.

To quote from Dr. Wm. Capp, “An appreciation of the situation cannot, however, be expected in the young who, in the surge of mental and bodily development, with its charming surprises of novelty, heedlessly float along in the present quite unconscious of future dangers, of which it is impossible for them to know, except they be warned by trusted guides.” He then adds, “The best social interests of the race are in the keeping of faithful mothers. Their education, both of intellect and heart, should be of the highest order.”

Instead of any inducement having been offered our young people for extending their knowledge of self, a premium has been put upon ignorance, and the result has been in many cases disastrous to both health and morals. The time is not far distant, we believe, when our young people will refuse any longer to be considered, in the knowledge of self, ignorantly pure. Ignorance is not purity, but is often the cause of the grossest impurity; while intelligent knowledge is productive of purity of the highest and noblest type.

Further if our young wives would know themselves, they must of necessity become acquainted with the peculiarities, physical and mental, of father, mother, grandfather and grandmother. In other words, they must not only know themselves as they are, but the families from which they sprang; then will they know, measurably, the possibilities of their natures, and their limitations.