Parents are to blame for the total absence, during the education of their daughters, of proper instruction upon this subject. In the schools for the education of young women the course of study which has been especially arranged for the intellectual training and equipment of young men has been followed without being adapted to the special necessities of intelligent young women. They are taught many things which may serve a good purpose in securing mental discipline, but which are in every other respect impracticable, and, so far as the great purposes of their life are concerned, wholly useless. All the subjects which are best calculated to fit them for their intended position of wife and mother are studiously avoided; they are kept in profound ignorance on all subjects of special physiology, and the question of maternity dare not so much as be mentioned by the professors in the class-room. What adds to this condition is the sad fact that parents do not supplement by personal instruction this lack of teaching in the school. Hundreds of young women are married who are so stupid as never to have asked where children come from, have no idea of the marital relation and the legitimate purpose for which God instituted the relation. When conception takes place, they do not know how to take care of themselves or prepare for the event which could be robbed of its terrors by intelligence. The birth of their first child is attended with such anguish and agony that forever after the marital relation becomes to them one of great dread, and to escape the condition which is so full of terror to them they resort to the destruction of unborn human life.
To correct this great wrong, the first and most essential step is the widespread dissemination of intelligence upon this subject. Marriage needs to be lifted into the light of a sacred and divine institution. The tenderest and most sacred relations of human life need to be preserved in their purity, so that pure-minded parents may speak of these relations without shame and blushing. Young women of mature years should be made familiar with the physiological conditions which attend conception and maternity, and they need to know that from the moment of conception life exists in the embryo, and that from the moment the spermatozoön enters and assimilates with the ovum a separate individual life is really begun, and that she is, at that very moment, the mother of this life within her as truly as when, in the later months, she feels the quickening within her, or after its birth experiences the joy of a mother who clasps her newborn infant in her arms.
But the crime of abortion does not rest wholly with the mothers. A large part of the guilt also belongs to the fathers. We may warn the wives against the terrible sin and awful physical consequences of abortion, but so long as husbands are unwilling to govern their passions, or to regulate their marital relations in harmony with the teachings of Scripture, but insist upon unlimited self-indulgence, the evils cannot be wholly corrected. Husbands need to be taught to look at the question from the wife's standpoint. The wrong is not all upon one side.
In a meeting of women only, after an address by a physician upon these subjects, a woman rose and said substantially as follows: "After I was married two years I became the mother of a puny, sickly baby. It required incessant care and watching to keep it alive. When it was only seven months old, to my surprise, astonishment and horror, I felt quickening, and for the first time I knew I was pregnant again. I was abased, humiliated! The sense of degradation that filled my soul cannot be described. What had been done? The babe that was born and the babe that was unborn were both to be robbed of their just inheritance. In tears and shame I told my mother, but she said: 'My child, why should you grieve and go on as you do? Don't you know that your children are legitimate?' My whole being rose in rebellion. I stamped my foot and almost screamed: 'Although my husband is the father of my children, they are not legitimate. No man-made laws, no priestly rites, can make an act legitimate that deprives innocent children of their right to life and health.' And then, with sobs and moans, reaction came, and I fainted in my mother's arms. What was the sequel? Two years later both of these children, after a brief existence, were lying side by side in the city of the dead, and until my husband and I learned the great laws which God has written deep in our being, we were not able to have children that could live."
The following somewhat lengthy but impressive quotation is from "Chastity," by Doctor Dio Lewis:
"Before we married I informed my husband of my dread of having children. I told him I was not prepared to meet the sufferings and responsibilities of maternity. He entered into an arrangement to prevent it for a specified time. This agreement was disregarded. After the legal form was over, and he felt he could now indulge his passion without loss of reputation and under legal and religious sanctions, he insisted on the surrender of my person to his will. He violated the promise at the beginning of our united life. That fatal bridal night! It has left a cloud on my soul and on my home that can never pass away on earth. I can never forget it. It sealed the doom of our union as it has done of thousands.
"He was in feeble health; so was I; and both of us mentally depressed. But the sickly germ was implanted, and conception took place. We were poor and destitute, having made no preparations for a home, ourselves and child. I was a stricken woman. In September following we came to——, and settled in a new country. In the March following, my child, developed under a heart throbbing with dread and anguish at the thought of its existence, was born. After three months' struggle I became reconciled to my first unwelcome child. But the impress of my impatience and hostility to its existence previous to its birth was on my child, never to be effaced, and to this hour that child is the victim or an undesired maternity.
"In one year I found I was to be again a mother. I was in a state of frightful despair. My first-born was sickly and very troublesome (how could it be otherwise?) needing constant care and nursing. My husband chopped wood for our support. Of the injustice of bringing children into the world to struggle with poverty and misery I was then as sensible as now. I was in despair. I felt that death would be preferable to maternity under such circumstances. A desire and a determination to get rid of my child entered into my heart. I consulted a lady friend, and by her persuasion and assistance killed it. Within less than a year maternity was again imposed upon me, with no better prospect of doing justice to my child. It was a most painful conviction to me; I felt that I could not have another child at that time. All seemed dark as death. I had begged and prayed to be spared this trial again until I was prepared to accept it joyfully; but my husband insisted upon his gratification, without regard to my wishes and condition.
"I consulted a physician, and told him of my unhappy state of mind and my aversion to having another child for the present. He was ready with his logic, his medicines and instruments, and told me how to destroy it. After experimenting on myself three months, I was successful. I killed my child about five months after conception.
"A few months after this, maternity was again forced upon me, to my grief and anguish. I determined again on my child's destruction; but my courage failed as I came to the practical deed. My health and life were in jeopardy. For my living child's sake I wished to live. I made up my mind to do the best I could for my unborn babe, whose existence seemed so unnatural and repulsive. I knew its young life would be deeply and lastingly affected by my mental and physical condition. I became, in a measure, reconciled to my dark fate, and was as resigned and happy as I could be under the circumstances. I had just such a child as I had every reason to expect. I could do no justice to it. How could I?