Conception Control and Its Effects on the Individual and the Nation | Page 4

to
work, housing, food and recreation as shall ensure the maximum of
vitality to the workers. This is the true method of conception control.
There comes a point in the development of nervous energy which is
productive of sterility. It is true that principles based on so many
varying factors will necessarily appear to fail in individual cases.
Environment with its influence on the nervous energy of the individual
will be modified by the inherited tendency of that individual towards
fertility or the reverse. We find, therefore, isolated cases of large
families among the well-to-do and small families among those whose
vitality is below the normal, but if the general principle is true we
should expect to find a larger number of sterile marriages among the
well-to-do than among those whose lives are more full of hardship, and
this undoubtedly is the case.
This aspect of the problem is deserving of careful study. The desire for
children in so many homes where every advantage could be given, may
be gratified when more knowledge of how wisely to modify the
environment of the rich is within our grasp.
It may be that the more simple life among those who have much will
give to them the prize of children which they covet more than things
which wealth can buy.
But let us return for a moment to the false expectation that children will
come to all unless prevented.
The results of this assumption are really serious. They involve the
training of large numbers of people in unnatural practices, which in
many cases are unnecessary, even if they were desirable. They rob
many families of the children who would have been the delight of their
parents through middle and later life.

Moreover, it is obvious that advice which may be quite necessary in
cases of ill-health or special conditions, may be fundamentally wrong
to give broadcast to all individuals, for apart from the fact that when
given to all it is largely unnecessary, there are other serious objections,
as follows:--
1. A public opinion at the present time is being gradually produced
which takes it for granted that as a matter of good form young people
should not have children for a few years after marriage, and it is
becoming a common practice to start married life with sordid and
unnatural preparations for a natural act; yet many of these young people,
men and women alike, are most anxious to have children, and only seek
to know how to prevent them because they believe it to be "the thing to
do."
One or two illustrations which have come to my personal knowledge
will perhaps show the kind of idea which is conveyed to the mind of
young people by books and speeches on this subject, though such
results may not have been desired by the authors or speakers.
A young bride came to her mother on returning from her honeymoon
and said, "Mother, how long must we wait before having children--is it
really necessary to prevent them for a year or two? We are both dying
to have babies."
A young couple on the eve of marriage consulted a gynæcologist
regarding the question of using the cap pessary to prevent the
possibility of having children for a few years.
The bride, who was greatly distressed, produced the pessary which she
had purchased, and said she could not possibly use it; her fiancé,
however, had been advised that she could, and ought to do so, hence
the first serious dispute had arisen between them, clouding the future.
She was told by her doctor that it was quite impossible for her, and this
fully satisfied the future husband.
The next point was if this method were impossible what should be

used.
They were a splendid young couple, with ample means to support a
family, and the doctor naturally asked--"But for what purpose do you
need any methods to prevent children at all?" They hesitated and
looked at each other, and then said--"I don't know, but we thought it
was the thing to do."
They left with the whole nightmare put aside, determined not to spoil
the perfect consummation of their happiness.
Many similar cases might be quoted where young people, without any
considered motive, are acting in accordance with the vogue of the
moment.
2. The use of contraceptives does not encourage self-control, yet the
cultivation of self-control is a far higher gain to the individual and the
nation than any apparent advantages obtained by its abandonment.
By no means unimportant is the influence that wide diffusion of the
knowledge of how to prevent conception would have in causing more
irregular unions and greater promiscuity in sex relations. The effect of
this would not only loosen, rather than strengthen, the marriage tie, but
would inevitably lead