Various notable men and women, and, in particular, the famous Dr. Trall of America, have held that the actual hour of conception is the one of fate, and that the moods, feelings and conditions of the parents in that hour work more vital magic then than they can do in any succeeding days or weeks. Instinctively, one would like to feel that this is so. Indeed it will take much to disprove it, although it is a theme which it is at present impossible to prove, and it must remain always only a personal bias, until thousands of people who view marriage aright will consciously observe and record many things and contribute them to some thinker who will tabulate, correlate and understand them.
Whether the hour of conception affects the child directly or not, the memory of an ardent and wonderful experience in which the pair of lovers consciously surround themselves with beautiful conditions, and deliberately place themselves through their love at the service of God and humanity in the creation of the next generation, must give a vitalizing and joyous memory to both throughout all their lives. This memory being especially connected with the dear child of that union must, therefore, have in this indirect way at any rate a positive racial value.
CHAPTER III
The Gateway of Pain
As when desire, long darkling, dawns, and firs
The mother looks upon the newborn child,
Even so my Lady stood at gaze and smiled
When her soul knew at length the Love it nurs’d.
Born with her life, creature of poignant thirst
And exquisite hunger, at her heart Love lay
Quickening in darkness, till a voice that day
Cried on him, and the bonds of birth were burst.
D. G. Rossetti.
The price of every beauty in this world is in proportion to its quality, even although the payment of the price exacted may be long deferred or may be made in such an intricate and remote form that its connection with the result is overlooked.
As the greatest thing which lovers can give each other is a child, and as none in the world are so great as lovers, the price exacted by Nature for the child of loving and sensitive people is correspondingly heavy.
This statement may apparently conflict with the idea that the joy of bearing a child to the beloved is a woman’s consummation of happiness; yet it does not conflict, because of the deeper truth that the supremest happiness is mysteriously intermingled with self-sacrifice. A young woman whose character is sufficiently beautiful and sensitive to know the highest joys of motherhood—the full delights of human existence and love—will also be sensitive to the varied pains which motherhood will bring. Indeed, in this respect, the poet’s saying that “the heart that is soonest awake to the flowers is always the first to be pricked by the thorn” is essentially true.
The radiance of the highest form of motherhood is that of the transfigured saint, hallowed by suffering comprehended and endured, transmuted into a service beyond and above the lower desires of self.