These long extracts are here quoted because, as The Spectator has remarked, "an attempt at a detailed summary might destroy the careful balance which is essential to Lord Dawson's purpose." It might indeed; and many a true word is written inadvertently and despite the wisdom of the serpent. As Lord Dawson believes that Malthusian practice is not of necessity sinful, and as he is urging the Church to remove a ban on that practice, it is necessary for him to prove in the first place that his opinion is right and that the teaching of the Church is wrong. Elsewhere in these pages I have stated the reasons why Christian morality brands the act of artificial birth control as intrinsically a sin, a malum in se, and those reasons have never been disproved by Lord Dawson or by anyone. His comparison between the use of contraceptives and eating or drinking is a false analogy. Eating is a natural act, not in itself sinful, whereas the use of contraceptives is an unnatural act, in itself a sin. The extent to which artificial birth control is practised neither increases nor diminishes the sinful nature of the act, but merely indicates the number of times the same sin is committed. Lord Dawson admits the danger of Neo-Malthusian methods being carried to excess, and counsels that these practices be used in moderation; but is it likely that those who have discarded the teaching of a Church and the dictates of the moral law will be seriously influenced by what he calls "an appeal to patriotism"?
Now there is one appeal to patriotism which Lord Dawson could have made but did not make. He might have pleaded that for the sake of the nation all attempts at unnatural birth control amongst the wealthier and more leisured citizens should be abandoned forthwith, and that the lawful form should be confined to those few cases where limitation of the family is justified on genuine medical grounds. But he refrained from making that appeal, and his plea for the use of contraceptives in moderation is more likely to be quoted with approval in the boudoirs of Mayfair than in humbler homes.
Lord Dawson's grave error in failing to anticipate the inevitable consequences of his deplorable speech is becoming more and more apparent. In the columns of The Daily Herald, cheek by jowl with advertisements concerning "Herbalists," "Safe and Sure Treatment for Anaemia, Irregularities, etc.," "Knowledge for Young Wives," and "Surgical Goods and Appliances," there appears the following notice:
"Lord Dawson, the King's Physician, says, 'Birth control has come to stay.' Following up this honest and daring declaration, the Liberator League have decided to distribute 10,000 copies of its publications free to applicants sending stamped addressed envelopes to J.W. Gott, Secretary … London, N.W.5."
A stamped addressed envelope brought in return sample copies of two undated newsprints, entitled The Rib Tickler and The Liberator, and, to the honour of newsvendors, we learn that these papers are "not supplied by newsagents." The first print is devoted to Blasphemy, and the second to Birth Control. Both papers are edited by J.W. Gott, "of London, Leeds, Liverpool, and other prisons," who, when he is not in jail for selling blasphemous or obscene literature, earns a livelihood by a propaganda of "Secularism, Socialism, and Neo-Malthusianism," combined with the sale of contraceptives. At Birmingham in 1921 this individual, according to his own statement, was charged, on eleven summonses, with having sent "an obscene book" and "obscene literature" through the post, and with "publishing a blasphemous libel of and concerning the Holy Scriptures and the Christian Religion." "The Malthusian League (at their own expense, for which I here wish to thank them) sent their Hon. Secretary, Dr. Binnie Dunlop, who gave evidence" … that the Council of the Malthusian League … "most strongly protests against the description of G. Hardy's book, How to prevent Pregnancy, as obscene, for that book gives in a perfectly refined and scientific way this urgently needed information." This opinion was not shared by the jury, who brought in a verdict of guilty, and Gott was sentenced to six months' imprisonment. From the Liberator we learn that the Treasurer of the Liberator League was fined £20, having been found guilty on the following summons—"for that you on the eleventh day of September 1920, at the Parish of Consett, in the County aforesaid, unlawfully, wickedly, maliciously, and scandalously did sell to divers persons, whose names are unknown, in a public street, there situate, a certain lewd, wicked, scandalous, and obscene print entitled 'Large or Small Families,' against the Peace of our Sovereign Lord the King, His Crown and Dignity."
Lord Dawson's advice was indeed perilous because "the British Empire and all its traditions will decline and fall if the Motherland is faithless to motherhood"; [120] and the nation would do better to pay heed to the following words of His Majesty the King: "The foundations of national glory are in the homes of the people. They will only remain unshaken while the family life of our race and nation is strong, simple, and pure."
All Lord Dawson's arguments are hoary fallacies. "Once more, careful distinction needs to be made between"—anaesthetics and contraceptives. Anaesthetics assist the birth of a child, whereas contraceptives frustrate the act of procreation. The old explanation that man's progress has been achieved by harnessing and not by opposing the forces of nature is dismissed with ignominy. The age-long teaching of Hippocrates that the healing art was based on the Vis Medicatrix Naturae is overthrown by Lord Dawson of Penn, in a single sentence; and in place of the Father of Medicine as a guide to health of body and mind, there comes the King's Physician:
"To pestle a poison'd poison behind his crimson lights."
When a great leader announces the birth of a new epoch, it is meet that the rank and file remain silent; and at this Congress of the Church of England no jarring interruptions marred the solemnity of the moment. No old-fashioned doctor was there to utter a futile protest, and there was no simple-minded clergyman to rise in the name of Christ and give Lord Dawson the lie. Without dissent, on a public platform of the Established Church, presided over by a Bishop, and in full view of the nation, "the moth-eaten mantle of Malthus, the godless robe of Bradlaugh, and the discarded garments of Mrs. Besant," [121] were donned—by the successor of Lister. It was a proud moment for the birth controllers, but for that national institution called "Ecclesia Anglicana" a moment full of shame.
[Footnote 100: British Medical Journal, August 6, 1921, p. 219.]