"Loved? Loved?" I cried. "Could Love allow all this? Could Love not guard and feed, could Love not teach and save?"
"Alas, no!" she said. "I gave Love: it was all I had. I had neither Knowledge nor Freedom, nor Wisdom, nor Power: and I could not guard nor feed nor teach nor save. But I could love and I could serve—and I could suffer."
And the eyes of The Child, steady, clear, deep as all Time, were on me; and I felt his pain.
Then the moving screen of The Past was swept away and The Present spread and widened before me 'till I saw the whole wide range of Earth in all its starlit glory and sunlit joy—and everywhere The Child. Also everywhere The Mother—still loving, still serving, still suffering, still without Knowledge or Wisdom or Freedom or Power, still unable to guard or feed or teach or save.
Disease seized upon The Child, disease planted in his bones and blood by his Father while the Mother, blind and helpless, became partner in this Unnatural Crime. Disease preyed upon The Child, disease from ignorance and disease from poverty and disease from pride; and the Doctors strove with the diseases—and they strove also with the Mothers, but in vain.
Poverty preyed upon The Child: he suffered for lack of life's necessities, for decency and comfort, for peace and beauty and cleanliness. And the Fathers strove with Poverty. But the Mothers remained alone—and loved and served and suffered.
Labor preyed upon The Child. Forced Labor, Premature Labor, hard, grinding, destructive Labor such as wastes the tissues of strong men; and The Child went down before it like grass before the scythe, for Childhood is meant for Growth and not for Waste and Toil. The Mind of The Child was dulled, the Body of The Child was stunted and crippled and broken: accidents fell upon him, with the Special Diseases of Labor and Premature Death.
And I cried out to The Mother—that mighty figure I saw dimly there behind The Child—to save The Child. But there replied only the faint, piping voices of a million mothers, isolated and alone, each sorrowing one heart-full for one child—and sorrowing in vain.
"My child is dead!" said one, and wept.
"Mine is a cripple!" said another, and wept.