The earnest friend who asks as to the right attitude of a mother toward her children, born and unborn, asks too much. No explicit "answers" can be given to such life-covering queries. One may reply epigrammatically (and unsatisfactorily) as this:
The first duty of a mother is to be a mother worth having.
The second duty of a mother is to select a father worth having.
The third duty of a mother is to bring up children worth having—and to have children worth bringing up!
Motherhood is a personal process, Child-culture is a social process.
A vigorous well-placed wisely working woman should take her child-bearing naturally, not make too much ado about it. But child-rearing—that is another matter.
We can advise as to one wanting a gardener, "Get a good one."
If there are none—then it is not time we made some?
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Books by Charlotte Perkins Gilman