Conception Control and Its Effects on the Individual and the Nation | Page 8

directly
opposed to the advocacy of cleanliness and non-interference with the
genital organs, which is the natural habit of healthy-minded women.
The effects, however, go further than this. Nature has provided in the
healthy vaginal secretions an antidote to infection which quickly
destroys harmful germs. If the natural secretions are altered it is
difficult to restore them to their natural quality.
Professor Arthur Thomson, F.R.C.S., has shewn ("British Medical
Journal," January 7th, 1922) from observations of the lining of the
womb in animals and in women that "the weight of evidence goes to
prove that its function is more likely to be absorbent than excretive, and
that as such it plays an important part in the animal economy."
After describing at length the evidence that the male secretion consists
largely of the secretions from special glands as well as the sex cells, he
refers to the fact that these are all largely received into and absorbed by
the glands of the womb, and he discusses the probability that such
absorption profoundly and beneficially affects the physiological
reaction in the woman. He points out that the use of artificial checks
"while preventing fertilisation may also be the means of depriving the
female of certain secretions which may exercise a far reaching
influence on her economy"; and he concludes, "As a rule we cannot
interfere with the normal course of nature without some consequent
evil result. May this not be an instance in which for some apparent gain
in one direction, the woman pays the penalty?"

CHAPTER IV
THE EFFECT OF WIDESPREAD CONCEPTION CONTROL ON
NATIONAL EFFICIENCY
In every nation individual capacity varies within wide limits. We have
men and women of brilliant attainments, and of all grades of
intelligence ranging downwards to the mentally defective. There is no
doubt that all grades of intelligence can be improved by education, but
there appears to be a limit to the capacity of development of each
individual. Lower intelligence, therefore, is not only due to lack of
opportunity, but to an inborn constitutional defect.
Further study has shewn this defect to be hereditary--the parents or
grandparents of such people shew defective intelligence, and their
offspring are likely to do the same; indeed, if two mentally defective
people marry it is fairly certain that their children will all be mentally
defective.
There are, however, no sharply defined classes of intelligence; just as
the mentally defective are in many grades, so ordinary men and women
vary from low or average intelligence up to outstanding cases of genius
or capacity.
By the newer methods of mental testing it has been shewn that children
of various classes of the community, as well as men and women of
different races, can be grouped according to their intellectual capacity,
and that no educational facilities will develop that capacity beyond a
certain point.
Professor W. McDougall, F.R.S., in his most useful and interesting
book on National Welfare and National Decay, reaches the important
conclusion "that innate capacity for intellectual growth is the
predominant factor in determining the distribution of intelligence in
adults, and that the amount and kind of education is a factor of
subordinate importance." He claims that the evidence is overwhelming

as to the validity of the results obtained by mental testing.
A few examples of experimental work given in Professor McDougall's
book will suffice to show the trend of these results.
Tests of intelligence were carried out on recruits for the American
Army, white and coloured, and they shewed marked superiority of the
white race.
A special test was carried out in Oxford by Mr. H.B. English, who
compared the capacity of boys in a school attended by children of the
intellectual classes with that of boys in a very good primary school,
whose fathers were shop-keepers, skilled artisans, etc., coming from
homes which were good, with no sort of privation. The result showed
marked superiority of the sons of intellectual parents. Mr. English
concludes that the children of the professional classes, between 12 and
14 years of age, exhibit very marked intelligence, and he is convinced
that the hereditary factor plays an altogether predominant part.
In another experiment, Miss Arlitt, of Bryn Mawr College, tested 342
children from primary schools in one district, who were divided into
four groups:--
Group 1. Professional. Group 2. Semi-professional and higher business.
Group 3. Skilled labour. Group 4. Semi-and unskilled labour.
Marked differences between the groups were shewn. The intellectual
capacity was represented by figures as follows:--
Group 1 125 Group 2 118 Group 3 107 Group 4 92
A further research of 548 children, grouped according to the occupation
of their father, gave its results in terms of the percentage of children in
each group who scored a mark higher than the median for the whole
548. They are as follows:--
Professional