Congenital
sterility was rare, but the number of children born in
England was decreasing.
England was decreasing.
Sutherland - Birth Control- A Statement of Christian Doctrine against the Neo-Malthusians
If fifty young married couples settle on the virgin
soil of a new country it is probable that for many years an enormous
birth-rate, of over 100, will coexist with a low death-rate.
In reality a high birth-rate may coexist with a low death-rate, or with a
high death-rate. For example, there is a difference between natural and
artificial poverty, the first being brought about by God, or, if any reader
prefers to have it so, by Nature, and the second being made by man. Under
conditions of natural poverty small groups of people in an open country are
surrounded by land not yet cultivated: whereas artificial poverty means
a population overcrowded and underfed, living in dark tenements or in
back-to-back houses, breathing foul air in ill-ventilated rooms seldom lit
by the sun, working long hours in gas-lit workshops for a sweated wage,
buying the cheapest food in the dearest market, and drugged by bad liquor.
In either case their existence is threatened, although for very different
reasons, and the birth-rate rises; but under conditions of natural poverty
the death-rate is low, whereas in slums the death-rate is high.
Section 3. THE LAW OF DECLINE
It would appear, then, that under conditions of hardship the birth-rate
tends to rise, and that in circumstances of ease the birth-rate tends to
fall. If the existence of the inhabitants in a closed country is threatened
by scarcity, the birth-rate tends to rise. For example, "In some of the
remote parts of the country, Orkney and Shetland, the population remained
practically stationary between the years 1801 and 1811, and in the next ten
years, still years of great scarcity, it increased 15 per cent. " [56]
The governing principle may be expressed in the following generalisation.
When the existence of a community is threatened by adversity the birth-rate
tends to rise; but when the existence of a community is threatened by
prosperity the birth-rate tends to fall. By adversity I mean war, famine,
scarcity, poverty, oppression, an untilled soil, and disease: and by
prosperity I mean wealth, luxury, idleness, a diet too rich--especially in
flesh meat--and over-civilisation, whereby the physical laws of nature
are defied. Now the danger of national decline owing to prosperity can
be avoided by a nation that observes the moral law, and this is the most
probable explanation of the fact that in Ireland, although the general
prosperity of the people has rapidly increased since George Wyndham
displaced landlordism over a large area by small ownership, the birth-rate
has continued to rise. Moreover, the danger to national existence, as we
have already indicated (Chapter I, Section. 10) is greater from moral than
from physical catastrophes, and when both catastrophes are threatened the
ultimate issue depends upon which of the two is the greater. Furthermore,
it would appear that moral catastrophes inevitably lead to physical
catastrophes. This is best illustrated by the fate of ancient Greece.
Section 4. ILLUSTRATED FROM GREEK HISTORY [Reference: Dangers]
The appositeness of this illustration arises from the fact that ancient
Greece reached a very high level of material and intellectual civilisation,
yet perished owing to moral and physical disasters.
(a) _Moral Catastrophe in Ancient Greece_
The evidence of the moral catastrophe is to be found in the change that
occurred in the Greek character most definitely after the fourth century
before Christ. Of this Mr. W. H. S. Jones has given the following account:
"Gradually the Greeks lost their brilliance, which had been as the
bright freshness of early youth. This is painfully obvious in their
literature, if not in other forms of art. Their initiative vanished;
they ceased to create and began to comment. Patriotism, with rare
exceptions, became an empty name, for few had the high spirit and
energy to translate into action man's duty to the State. Vacillation,
indecision, fitful outbursts of unhealthy activity followed by cowardly
depression, selfish cruelty, and criminal weakness are characteristic
of the public life of Greece from the struggle with Macedonia to the
final conquest by the arms of Rome. No one can fail to be struck by the
marked difference between the period from Marathon to the Peloponnesian
War and the period from Alexander to Mummius. Philosophy also suffered,
and became deeply pessimistic even in the hands of its best and noblest
exponents. 'Absence of feeling,' 'absence of care'--such were the
highest goals of human endeavour.
"How far this change was due to other causes is a complicated question.
The population may have suffered from foreign admixture during the
troubled times that followed the death of Alexander. There were,
however, many reasons against the view that these disturbances produced
any appreciable difference of race. The presence of vast numbers of
slaves, not members of households, but the gangs of toilers whom the
increase of commerce brought into the country, pandered to a foolish
pride that looked upon many kinds of honourable labour as being
shameful and unbecoming to a free man. The very institution that made
Greek civilisation possible encouraged idleness, luxury, and still
worse vices. Unnatural vice, which in some States seems to have been
positively encouraged, was prevalent among the Greeks to an almost
incredible extent. It is hard not to believe that much physical harm
was caused thereby; of the loss to moral strength and vigour there is
no need to speak. The city-state, again, however favourable to the
development of public spirit and a sense of responsibility, was doomed
to fail in a struggle against the stronger Powers of Macedon and Rome.
The growth of the scientific spirit destroyed the old religion. The
more intellectual tried to find principles of conduct in philosophy;
the ignorant or half-educated, deprived of the strong moral support
that always comes from sharing the convictions of those abler and wiser
than oneself, fell back upon degrading superstitions. In either case
there was a serious loss of that spirit of self-sacrifice and devotion
which a vigorous religious faith alone can bestow. Without such a
spirit, as history proves conclusively, no nation or people can
survive. " [57]
(b) _The Physical Catastrophe induced by Selfishness_
One of the physical catastrophes that probably most accelerated the fall
of Greek civilisation was malarial fever. The parasite of this disease is
carried from man to man by Anopheline mosquitoes. These insects, during
the stage of egg, larva, and nympha, live in water, and afterwards, as
developed insects, in the air. The breeding-grounds, where the eggs are
laid, are shallow pools of stagnant water. For that reason the disease is
most common in marshy country, and tends to disappear when the land is
properly drained. Of this we have an example in England, whence malaria
disappeared as the marshes were drained.
In Homer there is a disputed reference to malaria, but it is not possible
to ascertain whether the disease was present during the rise of Greek
civilisation, and there are no references to this disease in the literature
from 700 B. C. to 550 B. C. [58] From this date references to malaria
gradually become more frequent, and Hippocrates stated that "those who live
in low, moist, hot districts, and drink the stagnant water, of necessity
suffer from enlarged spleen. They are stunted and ill-shaped, fleshy and
dark, bilious rather than phlegmatic. Their nature is to be cowardly and
adverse from hardship; but good discipline can improve their character in
this respect. " [59] After an exhaustive study of the literature, Mr. Jones
concludes "that malaria was endemic throughout the greater part of the
Greek world by 400 B. C. "
Concerning the causes of a malarial epidemic, Sir Ronald Ross writes: [60]
"Suppose that the Anophelines have been present from the first, but that
the number of infected immigrants has been few. Then, possibly, some of
these people have happened to take up their abode in places where the
mosquitoes are rare; others may have recovered quickly; others may not have
chanced to possess parasites in suitable stages when they have been bitten.
Thus, the probability of their spreading infection would be very small. Or,
supposing even that some few new infections have been caused, yet, by our
rough calculations in section 12, _unless the mosquitoes are sufficiently
numerous_ in the locality, the little epidemic may die out after a
while--for instance, during the cool season. " The italics are mine, because
some writers have suggested that the decline of Greece was _due_ to
malaria, whereas I submit, as the more logical interpretation of the facts,
that a moral catastrophe led to the neglect of agriculture, whereby the
area of marshy land became more extensive, mosquitoes more numerous, and
the fever more prevalent.
In view of the foregoing facts, the following Malthusian statement,
although groundless, is nevertheless an amusing example of the errors that
arise from lack of a little knowledge:
"The difficulty of providing for a high birth-rate in a settled
community was appreciated by the ancient Greeks, notably by Plato and
Aristotle; but their conclusions were swept aside by the warlike spirit
of Rome, and the sentimentality of Christianity, so that only a few
isolated thinkers showed any appreciation of them. " [61]
[Footnote 51: Quoted in _The Law of Births and Deaths_, by Charles Edward
Pell, 1921, chap. xii. ]
[Footnote 52: _The Law of Births and Deaths_, 1921. ]
[Footnote 53: Ibid. , p. 40. ]
[Footnote 54: _The Law of Births and Deaths_, 1921, p. 41. ]
[Footnote 55: Ibid. , p. 40. ]
[Footnote 56: Dr. John Brownlee, _The Declining Birth-rate_, p. 156. ]
[Footnote 57: _Malaria and Greek History_, 1909, pp. 102 et seq. ]
[Footnote 58: Ibid. , p. 26. ]
[Footnote 59: Ibid. , p. 85. ]
[Footnote 60: _Report on the Prevention of Malaria in Mauritius_, p. 51. ]
[Footnote 61: C. V. Drysdale, O. B. E. , D. Sc. , _The Malthusian Doctrine and
its Modern Aspects_, p. 3. ]
CHAPTER VI
THE FALLING BIRTH-RATE IN ENGLAND: ITS CAUSES
Birth controllers claim that the fall in the English birth-rate, which
began to decline in 1876, is mostly due to the use of contraceptives: but
the very fact that this claim is made by these reckless propagandists makes
it imperative that we should scrutinise the evidence very carefully.
Section 1. NOT, AS MALTHUSIANS ASSERT, DUE MAINLY TO CONTRACEPTIVES
In support of the Malthusian contention, Dr. C. V. Drysdale, who is not a
doctor of medicine but a doctor of science, has published the following
statements:
". . . We might note that a recent investigation of the records of the
Quakers (the Society of Friends) reveals the fact that family
limitation has been adopted by them to a most astonishing extent. Their
birthrate [_sic_] stood at 20 per thousand in 1876, and has now
actually fallen to about 8 per thousand. The longevity of Quakers is
well known, and the returns of deaths given by their Society show that
the great majority live to between seventy and ninety years. Infantile
mortality is practically unknown among them, although none of the
special steps so dear to most social reformers have been taken for the
protection of infant life. The Quakers are well known to be very
earnest Christians, and to give the best example of religious morality.
Their probity in business and their self-sacrifice in humanitarian work
of all kinds are renowned. Yet it would seem that they have adopted
family restriction to a greater extent than any other body of people,
and, since the decline of their birth-rate only began in 1876, that it
is due to adoption of preventive methods. " [62]
Again, he translates the following quotation from a Swiss author:
"In France a national committee has been formed which has as its object
an agitation for the increase of the population. Upon this committee
these [? there] sit, besides President Poincaré, who, although married,
has no children, twenty-four senators and littérateurs. These
twenty-five persons, who preach to their fellow citizens by word and
pen, have between them nineteen children, or not one child on the
average per married couple. Similarly, a Paris journal
(_Intransigeant_, August and September, 1908) had the good idea of
publishing four hundred and forty-five names of the chief Parisian
personalities who are never tired of lending their names in support of
opposition to the artificial restriction of families. I give these
figures briefly without the names, which have no special interest for
us. Anyone interested in the names can consult the paper well known in
upper circles. Among them:
176 married couples had 0 children = 0 children
106 " " " 1 child = 106 "
88 " " " 2 children = 176 "
40 " " " 3 " = 120 "
19 " " " 4 " = 76 "
7 " " " 5 " = 35 "
4 " " " 6 " = 24 "
3 " " " 7 " = 21 "
1 " " " 9 " = 9 "
1 " " " 11 " = 11 "
Total 445 with 578
That is, an average one and a third children per couple, while each
single one of these families could much more easily have supported
twenty children than a working-class family a single child. "
"Comment on the above is superfluous," adds Dr. C. V. Drysdale, and with
that remark most people will cordially disagree. The obvious interpretation
of the foregoing figures is that there has been a decline in natural
fertility amongst highly educated and civilised people. But that
interpretation does not suit Dr. Drysdale's book, and hence we have the
disgraceful spectacle of a writer who, in order to bolster up an argument
which is rotten from beginning to end, does not hesitate to launch without
a particle of evidence a charge of gross hypocrisy against the Quakers of
England, a body of men and women who in peace and in war have proved the
sincerity of their faith, and against four hundred and seventy respected
citizens of Paris. Further comment on _that_ is superfluous. At the same
time it is obvious that, in so far as their pernicious propaganda spreads
and is adopted, Malthusians may claim to contribute to the fall of the
birth-rate, and towards the decline of the Empire.
Section 2. DECLINE IN FERTILITY DUE TO SOME NATURAL LAW
In the course of an inquiry on the fertility of women who had received a
college education, the National Birth Rate Commission [63] attempted to
discover to what extent birth control was practised amongst the middle and
professional classes. Of those amongst whom the inquiry was made 477 gave
definite answers, from which it was ascertained that 289, or 60 per cent. ,
consciously limited their families, or attempted to do so; and that 188,
or 40 per cent. made no attempt to limit their families. Amongst those who
limited their families 183 stated the means employed, and of these, 105,
or 57 per cent. , practised continence, whilst 78, or 43 per cent. , used
artificial or unnatural methods.
Now comes a most extraordinary fact. Dr. Major Greenwood, [64] a
statistician whose methods are beyond question, discovered that there was
no real mathematical difference between the number of children in the
"limited" families and the number in the unlimited families. In both groups
of families the number of children was smaller than the average family in
the general population, and in both groups there were fewer children than
in the families of the preceding generation to which the parents belonged.
Dr. Greenwood states that this is _prima facie_ evidence that deliberate
birth control has produced little effect, and that the lowered fertility is
the expression of a natural change. Nevertheless, he holds that the latter
explanation cannot be accepted as wholly proved on the evidence, owing to
certain defects in the data on which his calculations were based.
"I am of opinion that we should hesitate before adopting that
interpretation in view of the cogent indirect evidence afforded by
other data that the fall of the birth-rate is differential, and that
the differentiation is largely economic. There are at least two
considerations which must be borne in mind in connection with these
schedules. The first is, that all the marriages described as unlimited
may not have been so. I do not suggest that the answers are
intentionally false, but it is possible that many may have considered
that limitation implied the use of mechanical means; that marriages in
which the parties merely abstained from, _or limited the occasions of_,
sexual intercourse may have frequently entered as of unrestricted
fertility. "
The above italics are mine, because, if that surmise be correct, it goes
to prove that the restriction of intercourse to certain periods, which
restriction the married may lawfully practise, is as efficacious in
limiting the size of a family as are those artificial methods of birth
control contrary both to natural and to Christian morality. Dr. Major
Greenwood continues as follows:
"In the second place, the schedules do not provide us with information
as to when limitation was introduced. We are told, for instance, that
the size of the family was five and that its number was limited. This
may mean _either_ that throughout the duration of the marriage
preventive measures were adopted from time to time, _or_ that _after_
five children had been born fertile intercourse was stopped. In the
absence of detailed information on this point it is plainly impossible
to form an accurate judgment as to the effect of limitation. "
There are, therefore, no accurate figures to indicate the extent to which
birth control has contributed to the decline in the birth-rate.
Section 3. AND TO CHARACTER OF OCCUPATION
Moreover the claim of birth controllers, that the decline in the English
birth-rate is mainly due to the use of contraceptives, is rendered highly
improbable by the fact that the Registrar-General [65] has shown that in
1911 the birth-rate in different classes varied according to the occupation
of the fathers. The figures are these:
Births per 1,000 married
Social Class. males aged under 55, including
retired.
1. Unskilled workmen 213
2. Intermediate class 158
3. Skilled workmen 153
4. Intermediate 132
5. Upper and middle class 119
Thus, ascending the social scale, we find, in class upon class, that as the
annual income increases the number of children in the family diminishes,
until we come to the old English nobility of whom, according to Darwin, 19
per cent. are childless. These last have every reason to wish for heirs to
inherit their titles and what land and wealth they possess, and, as their
record in war proves them to be no cowards' breed, it would be a monstrous
indictment to maintain that their childlessness is mostly due to the use
of contraceptives. If _all_ these results arose from the practice of
birth control, it would imply a crescendo of general national selfishness
unparalleled in the history of humanity. No, it is not possible to give
Neo-Malthusians credit, even for all the evil they claim to have achieved.
Section 4. AGGRAVATED DOUBTLESS BY MALTHUSIANISM
Nevertheless, artificial birth control is an evil and too prevalent thing.
My contention is that the primary cause of our falling birth-rate is
over-civilisation; one of the most evil products of this over-civilisation,
whereby simple, natural, and unselfish ideals, based on the assumption that
national security depends on the moral and economic strength of family
life, have been replaced largely by a complicated, artificial, and
luxurious individualism; and that diminished fertility, apart from
the practice of artificial birth control, is a result of luxurious
individualism. Even if it be so, one of the most evil products of
over-civilisation is the use of contraceptives, because this practice, more
than any other factor in social life, hastens, directly and indirectly, the
fall of a declining birth-rate; and artificial birth control, to the extent
to which it is practised, therefore aggravates the consequences of a law of
decline already apparent in our midst. I have already said that restriction
of intercourse, as held lawful by the Catholic Church, is possibly as
efficacious in limiting the size of a family as are artificial methods.
If any man shall say that therefore there is no difference between these
methods, let him read the fuller explanation given in another connection on
p. 153. (See [Reference: Explanation]) The method which reason and morality
alike permit is devoid of all those evils, moral, psychological, and
physiological, that follow the use of contraceptives.
[Footnote 62: _The Small Family System_, pp. 195 and 160, New York, 1917. ]
[Footnote 63: _The Declining Birth-rate_, p. 323. ]
[Footnote 64: _The Declining Birth-rate_, p. 324. ]
[Footnote 65: _The Declining Birth-rate_, p. 9. ]
CHAPTER VII
THE EVILS OF ARTIFICIAL BIRTH CONTROL
Section 1. NOT A PHYSICAL BENEFIT
Birth control is alleged to be beneficial for men and women, and these
"benefits" are no less amazing than the fallacies on which this practice
is advocated. At the Obstetric Section of the Royal Society of Medicine
in 1921 the leading physicians on diseases of women condemned the use of
contraceptives. [66]
_A Cause of Sterility_
Dr. R. A. Gibbons, Physician to the Grosvenor Hospital for Women, said
that nowadays it was common for a young married woman to ask her
medical man for advice as to the best method of preventing conception.
The test of relative sterility was the rapidity with which conception
takes place. He had made confidential inquiries in 120 marriages. In
100 cases preventive measures had been used at one time or another, and
the number of children was well under 2 per marriage. In Paris some
time ago the birth-rate was 104 per 1,000 in the poorer quarters and
only 34 in a rich quarter of the city; in London comparative figures
had been given as 195 and 63 in poor and in rich quarters. These and
similar figures showed that women living in comfort and luxury did not
want to be bothered with confinements. It had been said that the degree
of sterility could be regarded as an index to the morals of a race.
Congenital sterility was rare, but the number of children born in
England was decreasing. It had been estimated that one-third of the
pregnancies in several great cities abroad aborted. Dr. Gibbons then
quoted figures given by Douglas Wight and Amand Routh to show the high
percentage of abortions and stillbirths. In his opinion it was the duty
of medical men to point out to the public that physiological laws could
not be broken with impunity. It had been observed that if the doe were
withheld from the buck at oestral periods atrophy of the ovary took
place. In this connection Dr. Gibbons recalled a large number of
patients who had used contraceptives in early married life, and
subsequently had longed in vain for a child. This applied also to those
who had decided, after the first baby, to have no more children, and
had subsequently regretted their decision.
_Neuroses_
Professor McIlroy, of the London School of Medicine for Women, deplored
the amount of time spent on attempting to cure sterility when
contraceptives were so largely used. The fact that neuroses were
largely the result of the use of contraceptives should be made widely
known, and also that in women the maternal passion was even stronger,
though it might develop later, than sexual passion, and would
ultimately demand satisfaction.
_Fibroid Tumours_
Dr. Arthur E. Giles, Senior Surgeon to the Chelsea Hospital for Women,
endorsed Dr. Gibbons's remarks as to the great unhappiness resulting
from deliberately childless marriages, and he added that he had always
warned patients of this. He believed that quinine had a permanently bad
effect. Those who waited for a convenient season to have a child often
laid up trouble for themselves. On the question of fibroid tumours he
had come to the conclusion that these were not a cause but in a sense a
consequence of sterility. Women who were subjected to sexual excitement
with no physiological outlet appear to have a tendency to develop
fibroids. He would like the opinion to go forth from the section that
the use of contraceptives was a bad thing.
All these authorities are agreed that the practice of artificial sterility
during early married life is the cause of many women remaining childless,
although later on these women wish in vain for children. To meet this
difficulty one of the advocates of birth control advises all young couples
to make sure of some children before adopting these practices; thus
demanding of young parents, at the very time when it is most irksome, that
very sacrifice of personal comfort and prosperity to prevent which is the
precise object of the vicious practice. Nor is sterility the only penalty.
The disease known as neurasthenia arises both in women _and in men_ in
consequence of these methods. Dr. Mary Sharlieb, [67] after forty years'
experience of diseases of women, writes as follows:
"Now, on the surface of things, it would seem as if a knowledge of how
to prevent the too rapid increase of a family would be a boon to
over-prolific and heavily burdened mothers. There are, however, certain
reasons which probably convert the supposed advantage into a very real
disadvantage. An experience of well over forty years convinces me that
the artificial limitation of the family causes damage to a woman's
nervous system. The damage done is likely to show itself in inability
to conceive when the restriction voluntarily used is abandoned because
the couple desire offspring.
"I have for many years asked women who came to me desiring children
whether they have ever practised prevention, and they very frequently
tell me that they did so during the early days of their married life
because they thought that their means were not adequate to the support
of a family. Subsequently they found that conception, thwarted at the
time that desire was present, fails to occur when it becomes
convenient. In such cases, even although examination of the pelvic
organ shows nothing abnormal, all one's endeavours to secure conception
frequently go unrewarded. Sometimes such a woman is not only sterile,
but nervous, and in generally poor health; but the more common
occurrence is that she remains fairly well until the time of the change
of life, when she frequently suffers more, on the nervous side, than
does the woman who has lived a natural married life. "
The late Dr. F. W. Taylor, President of the British Gynaecological Society,
wrote as follows in 1904:
"Artificial prevention is an evil and a disgrace. The immorality of it,
the degradation of succeeding generations by it, their domination or
subjection by strangers who are stronger because they have not given
way to it, the curses that must assuredly follow the parents of
decadence who started it,--all of this needs to be brought home to the
minds of those who have thoughtlessly or ignorantly accepted it, for it
is to this undoubtedly that we have to attribute not only the
diminishing birth-rate, but the diminishing value of our population.
"It would be strange indeed if so unnatural a practice, one so
destructive of the best life of the nation, should bring no danger or
disease in its wake, and I am convinced, after many years of
observation, that both sudden danger and chronic disease may be
produced by the methods of prevention very generally employed. . . . The
natural deduction is that the artificial production of modern times,
the relatively sterile marriage, is an evil thing, even to the
individuals primarily concerned, injurious not only to the race, but to
those who accept it. "
That was the opinion of a distinguished gynaecologist, who also happened
to be a Christian. The reader may protest that the latter fact is entirely
irrelevant to my argument, and that the value of a man's observations
concerning disease is to be judged by his skill and experience as a
physician, and not by his religious beliefs. A most reasonable statement.
Unhappily, the Neo-Malthusians think otherwise. They would have us believe
that because this man was a Christian his opinion, as a gynaecologist, is
worthless. C. V. Drysdale, O. B. E. , D. Sc. , after quoting Dr. Taylor's views,
adds the following foot-note:
"I have since learnt that Dr. Taylor was a very earnest Christian, and
the author of several sacred hymns and of a pious work, _The Coming of
the Saints_. " [68]
Furthermore, in 1905, the South-Western Branch of the British Medical
Association passed the following resolution:
"That this Branch is of opinion that the growing use of contraceptives
and ecbolics is fraught with great danger both to the individual and to
the race. That this Branch is of opinion that the advertisements and
sale of such appliances and substances, as well as the publication and
dissemination of literature relating thereto, should be made a penal
offence. " [69]
Section 2. A SCANDALOUS SUGGESTION
The foregoing opinions are very distasteful to Neo-Malthusians, and these
people, being unable apparently to give a reasoned answer, do not hesitate
to suggest that medical opposition, when not due to religious bias, is
certainly due to mercenary motives.
"As the Church has a vested interest in souls, so the medical
profession has a vested interest in bodies. Birth is a source of
revenue, direct and indirect. It means maternity fees first; it
generally presupposes preliminary medical treatment of the expectant
mother; and it provides a new human being to be a patient to some
member of the profession, humanly certain to have its share of
infantile diseases, and likely, if it survives them, to produce
children of its own before the final death-bed attendance is
reached. " [70]
That scandalous suggestion has recently been repeated by the President of
the Society for Constructive Birth Control and Racial Progress under the
following circumstances. On October 31, 1921, the _Sussex Daily News_
published the following paragraph from its London correspondent.
"BIRTH CONTROL
"Reverberations of Lord Dawson's recent sensational address to the
Church Congress on birth control are still being felt as well in
medical as in clerical circles. Indeed, the subject has been discussed
by the lawyers at Gray's Inn. The London Association of the Medical
Women's Federation had so animated a discussion on it that it was
decided to continue it at the next meeting. It is quite evident that
Lord Dawson did not speak for a united medical profession. Indeed,
quite a number of doctors of all creeds are attacking the new Birth
Control Society. A London physician has a pamphlet on the subject in
the Press, and the controversy rages fiercely in the neighbourhood of
'birth-control' clinics. Much is likely to be made of the example of
France, where the revolt against the practices advocated is now in full
swing, and strong legal measures have been taken and are in
contemplation. French medical opinion is said to be very pronounced on
the subject, and it has, of course, a great deal of clinical experience
to back it. "
On November 8, a second paragraph appeared:
"BIRTH CONTROL
"My remark recently that 'a number of doctors of all creeds are
attacking the new Birth-Control Society' has been challenged by the
hon. secretary of the body in question, who observes that I am
misinformed. I must adhere to my statement, which was a record of
personal observation. Many doctors have spoken to me on the subject,
and their opinions on the ethics of birth control differ widely; but I
can only remember one who did not attack this particular society. The
secretary suggests that I am confusing what his society advocates with
something else. As a matter of fact, the whole question of birth
control has been discussed more than once by medical bodies. A doctor
who attended one such discussion shortly after the opening of the
clinic in Holloway told me that, while there was division of opinion on
the general subject, the feeling of the meeting was overwhelming
against the particular teaching given at the clinic, as undesirable and
actively mischievous. The subject is controversial, and I profess to do
no more than record such opinions as are current. "
On November 17 the _Sussex Daily News_ published the following letter:
"CONSTRUCTIVE BIRTH CONTROL
"Sir,--Your recent paragraph of 'opinions' about the Mothers' Clinic
and the Society for Constructive Birth Control and Racial Progress is
not only extremely unrepresentative, but grossly misleading. Your
writer says that he can only remember one doctor who did not attack
this particular society. This implies that the medical profession is
against it, which is absolutely untrue, as is quite evident from the
fact that we have three of the most distinguished medical men in Great
Britain on our list of Vice-Presidents; four others, also very
distinguished, on our Research Committee; and that Dr. E. B. Turner, in
a Press interview after the recent Church Congress, singled out
Constructive Birth Control as the only 'Control' which was not
mischievous.
"_That there may be medical men who do not approve of birth control is
natural, when one remembers that a doctor has to make his living, and
can do so more easily when women are ailing with incessant pregnancies
than when they maintain themselves in good health by only having
children when fitted to do so. Opinions of medicals, therefore, must be
sifted. The best doctors are with us; the self-seeking and the biassed
may be against us_.
"Details about the society, including the manifesto signed by a series
of the most distinguished persons, can be obtained on application to
the Honorary Secretary, at . . . London, N. 19. --Yours, etc.
"MARIE C. STOPES,
"President Society for Constructive and Racial Progress. "
The italics are mine, and they draw attention to a disgraceful statement
concerning the medical profession. As the reader is aware, certain members
of our profession approve of artificial birth control. What, I ask, would
be the opinion of the general public, and of my friends, if I were so
distraught as to suggest that these men approved of birth control because
they had a financial interest in the sale of contraceptives? That
suggestion would be as reckless and as wicked as the statement made by Dr.
Marie C. Stopes. In the _British Medical Journal_ of November 26 I quoted,
without comment, the above italicised paragraph as her opinion of the
medical profession, and on December 10 the following reply from the lady
appeared:
"Your two correspondents, Dr. Halliday Sutherland and Dr. Binnie
Dunlop, by quoting paragraphs without their full context, appear to
lend support to views which by implication are, to some extent,
detrimental to my own. This method of controversy has never appealed to
me, but in the interests of the society with which I am associated, I
must be allowed to answer the implications. The paragraph quoted by Dr.
Sutherland is not, as would appear from his letter, a simple opinion of
mine on the medical profession, but was written in reply to a rather
scurrilous paragraph so worded as to lead the public to believe that
the medical profession as a whole was against the Society for
Constructive Birth Control and Racial Progress. My answer, which
appeared not only in the papers quoted but in others, contained the
following statement: 'We have three of the most distinguished medical
men in Great Britain on our list of Vice-Presidents; four others, also
very distinguished, on our Research Committee. ' Reading these words
before the paragraph your correspondent quotes, and taking all in
conjunction with an attack implying that the entire medical profession
was against us, it is obvious that the position is rather different
from what readers of Dr. Sutherland's letter in your issue of November
26 might suppose. "
It will be noted that Dr. Stopes does not withdraw but attempts to justify
her scandalous suggestion by stating, firstly, that the full context of her
letter was not quoted by me, and secondly, that her original letter was
written "in reply to a rather scurrilous paragraph. "
As I have now quoted in full her original letter, excepting the address
of her society, and the two paragraphs from the _Sussex Daily News_, my
readers may form their own judgment on the following points: Is it possible
to maintain that the whole context of her original letter puts a different
complexion on her remarks concerning the medical profession? Can either
of the paragraphs from the _Sussex Daily News_ be truthfully described
as "rather scurrilous," or are they fair comment on a matter of public
interest? Moreover, even if a daily paper _had_ published a misleading
paragraph about this society, surely that is not a valid reason why its
President should make a malignant attack, not on journalists, but on the
medical profession?
Section 3. A CAUSE OF UNHAPPINESS IN MARRIAGE
Nor does birth control lead to happiness in marriage. On the contrary,
experience shows that the practice is injurious not only to the bodies
but also to the minds of men and women. As no method of contraception is
infallible, the wife who allows or adopts it may find herself in the truly
horrible position of being secretly or openly suspected of infidelity.
Again, when a family has been limited to one or two children and these die,
the parents may find themselves solitary and childless in old age; and
mothers thus bereaved are often the victims of profound and lasting
melancholy. The mother of a large family has her worries, many of them not
due to her children, but to the social evils of our time: and yet she is
less to be pitied than the woman who is losing her beauty after a fevered
life of, vanity and self-indulgence, and who has no one to love her, not
even a child.
Moreover, these practices have an influence on the relation between husband
and wife, on their emotions towards each other and towards the whole sexual
nisus. Mr. Bernard Shaw recently stated [71] that when people adopt methods
of birth control they are engaging, not in sexual intercourse, but in
reciprocal masturbation.
That is the plain truth of the matter. Or, from another point of view, it
may be said that the man who adopts these practices is simply using his
wife as he would use a prostitute, as indeed was said long ago by St.
Thomas Aquinas. [72] The excuse offered for illicit sexual intercourse is
not usually pleasure, but that the sex impulse is irresistible: and the
same argument is used for conjugal union with prevention. In both cases the
natural result of union is not desired, and positive means are taken to
prevent it.
And what of the results on the mutual love, if an old-fashioned word be
not now out of place, and on the self-respect of two people so associated?
Birth control cannot make for happiness, because it means that mutual love
is at the mercy of an animal instinct, neither satisfied nor denied. It is
an old truth that those who seek happiness for itself never find it. And
yet the advocates of birth control have the temerity to claim that these
practices lead to happiness. I presume that of the bliss following marriage
with contraceptives the crowded lists of our divorce courts are an index.
The marriage bond is weakened when a common lasting interest in the care
of children is replaced by transient sexual excitement. Once pregnancy is
abolished there is no natural check on the sexual passions of husband or
wife, for they have learnt how sexual desire may be gratified without the
pain, publicity, and responsibility of having children. In the experience
of the world marriages based merely on passion are seldom happy, and
artificial birth control means passion uncontrolled by nature. These
methods are not practised by nations such as Ireland and Spain, who accept
the moral rule of the natural law expressed in God's commandments and
sanctioned by His judgments; and no man who has ever lived in these
countries could truthfully maintain that the people there, on whom the
burdens of marriage press as elsewhere, are in reality anxious to obtain
facilities for divorce. On the other hand, there are many who allege that
the people of England are shouting out for greater facilities for divorce
than they now possess. At any rate, it is obvious enough that there are
those amongst us who are straining every nerve to force such facilities
upon them.
Section 4. AN INSULT TO TRUE WOMANHOOD
It has been said that patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel; and
apparently chivalry is the last refuge of a fool. Some of the advocates of
birth control who have never thought the matter out, either passionately or
dispassionately, claim to speak on behalf of women. They protest that "many
women of the educated classes revolt against the drudgery, anxieties,
inconveniences, disease, and disfigurements which attend the yearly
child-bearing advocated by the moralist. " [73]
What moralist? Who ever said it? Again, they plead for women who "revolt"
from the "disfigurement" of the gestation period. The great artist
Botticelli did not think this was disfigurement. What true women do? Are
they not those of whom Kipling writes, "as pale and as stale as a bone"?
And, if so, are these unworthy specimens of their sex worth tears? The vast
majority of women bear the discomforts of gestation and the actual perils
and pangs of birth with exemplary fortitude: and it is a gross slander for
anyone to maintain that a few cowardly and degenerate individuals really
represent that devoted sex. But these writers are indeed well out of the
ruck of ordinary humanity, because they tell us that "whatever the means
employed, and whether righteous or not, the propensity to limit the highest
form of life operates silently and steadily amongst the more thoughtful
members of all civilized countries," and yet add that "it is not perhaps
good taste to consider the means employed to this end. " While they thus
approve and commend the practice of birth control as natural to "the
more thoughtful members," they nevertheless question the "good taste" of
discussing the very methods of which they approve, even in the columns of a
medical journal! Again, they tell us that "assuredly continence is not, and
never will be, the principal" method. That may be possibly true, so long as
Christianity is more professed than practised; God knows we are all lacking
enough in self-control. And yet throughout the ages moralists have preached
the advantages of self-control, and we ordinary men and women know that we
could do better, and that others who have gone before us have done better;
but it is the self-styled "thoughtful members" who proclaim to the world
that self-control in matters of sex is an impossibility, and therefore not
to be even attempted. They are no common people--these epicureans, selfish
even in their refinement. In addition to losing their morals, they have
certainly lost their wits.
Section 5. A DEGRADATION OF THE FEMALE SEX
In the Neo-Malthusian propaganda there is yet another fact which--should
be seized by every married woman, because it is a clear indication of a
tendency to reduce women to degrading subjection. No recommendations of
limited intercourse or of self-restraint according to the dictates
of reason or of affection are to be found in the writings of birth
controllers. Unrestrained indulgence, without the risk of consequences, is
their motto. To this end they advocate certain contraceptive methods, and
the reader should note that these methods require precautions to be taken
solely by the woman. If she fails to take these precautions, or if the
precautions themselves fail, all responsibility for the occurrence of
conception rests on her alone; because her Malthusian masters have decided
that she alone is to be, made responsible for preventing the natural or
possible consequences of intercourse. Why? That is a very interesting
question, and one to which a leading Neo-Malthusian has given the answer.
In 1854 there was published, _Physical, Sexual and Natural Religion: by a
Graduate of Medicine_. In the third edition the title was altered to _The
Elements of Social Science_, and the author's pseudonym to _A Doctor of
Medicine_. This book, which contains over 600 pages of small type, may be
truthfully described as the Bible of Neo-Malthusians, and includes, under
the curious heading _Sexual Religion_, a popular account of all venereal
and other diseases of sex. In the Preface to the first edition, [74] the
anonymous author states: "Had it not been the fear of causing pain to a
relation, I should have felt it my duty to put my name to this work; in
order that any censure passed upon it should fall upon myself alone. " The
relation appears to have had a long life, because anonymity was preserved
for fifty years, presumably out of respect for his, or her, feelings: and
he, or she, must have lived as long as the author, who died in 1904 at the
age of seventy-eight; because the author's name was not revealed until a
posthumous edition, the thirty-fifth, appeared in 1905, from which we learn
that the book was written by the late Dr. George Drysdale, brother of
the first President of the Malthusian League, and uncle of the present
incumbent. The last edition, in recompense for its smudgy type, contains a
most welcome announcement by the publisher:
"PUBLISHER'S NOTE. --. . . It is due alike to the reader and the publisher
to explain why the present edition is printed (in the main) from
stereotypes that have seen fifty years' service. The cost of resetting
the work would be prohibitive on the basis of present (and probable
future) sales. To some extent the plates have been repaired; but such
an expedient can do no more than remove the worse causes of offence. "
But the fact with which I am at present concerned is that in every edition
all contraceptive methods that apply to the male are _condemned_ for the
following reasons:
"The first of these modes [_coitus interruptus_] is physically
injurious, and is apt to produce nervous disorder and sexual
enfeeblement and congestion, from the sudden interruption it gives to
the venereal act, whose _pleasure_ moreover it interferes with. The
second, namely the sheath, _dulls the enjoyment_, and frequently
produces impotence in the man and disgust in both parties; so that it
also is injurious" (p. 349). . . . "Any preventive means, to be
satisfactory, must be used by the woman, as _it spoils the passion and
the impulsiveness_ of the venereal act _if the man have to think of
them_" (p. 350).
The italics are mine, but the following comments are by a woman, who was
moreover the first woman to qualify in medicine--the late Dr. Elizabeth
Blackwell.
"Here, in this chief teacher of the Neo-Malthusians, the cloven foot is
fully revealed. This popular author, who in many parts of his book
denounces marriage as the enslavement of men and women, who sneers at
continence, and rages at Christianity as a vanishing superstition--all
under a special pretence of benevolence and desire for the advancement
of the human race, here clearly, shows what he is aiming at, and what
his doctrines lead to. Male sexual pleasure must not be interfered
with, male lust may be indulged in to any extent that pleasure demands,
but woman must take the entire responsibility, that male indulgence be
not disturbed by any inconvenient claims from paternity. Whatever
consequences ensue the woman is to blame, and must bear the whole
responsibility.
"A doctrine more diabolical in its theory and more destructive in its
practical consequences has never been invented. This is the doctrine of
Neo-Malthusianism.
soil of a new country it is probable that for many years an enormous
birth-rate, of over 100, will coexist with a low death-rate.
In reality a high birth-rate may coexist with a low death-rate, or with a
high death-rate. For example, there is a difference between natural and
artificial poverty, the first being brought about by God, or, if any reader
prefers to have it so, by Nature, and the second being made by man. Under
conditions of natural poverty small groups of people in an open country are
surrounded by land not yet cultivated: whereas artificial poverty means
a population overcrowded and underfed, living in dark tenements or in
back-to-back houses, breathing foul air in ill-ventilated rooms seldom lit
by the sun, working long hours in gas-lit workshops for a sweated wage,
buying the cheapest food in the dearest market, and drugged by bad liquor.
In either case their existence is threatened, although for very different
reasons, and the birth-rate rises; but under conditions of natural poverty
the death-rate is low, whereas in slums the death-rate is high.
Section 3. THE LAW OF DECLINE
It would appear, then, that under conditions of hardship the birth-rate
tends to rise, and that in circumstances of ease the birth-rate tends to
fall. If the existence of the inhabitants in a closed country is threatened
by scarcity, the birth-rate tends to rise. For example, "In some of the
remote parts of the country, Orkney and Shetland, the population remained
practically stationary between the years 1801 and 1811, and in the next ten
years, still years of great scarcity, it increased 15 per cent. " [56]
The governing principle may be expressed in the following generalisation.
When the existence of a community is threatened by adversity the birth-rate
tends to rise; but when the existence of a community is threatened by
prosperity the birth-rate tends to fall. By adversity I mean war, famine,
scarcity, poverty, oppression, an untilled soil, and disease: and by
prosperity I mean wealth, luxury, idleness, a diet too rich--especially in
flesh meat--and over-civilisation, whereby the physical laws of nature
are defied. Now the danger of national decline owing to prosperity can
be avoided by a nation that observes the moral law, and this is the most
probable explanation of the fact that in Ireland, although the general
prosperity of the people has rapidly increased since George Wyndham
displaced landlordism over a large area by small ownership, the birth-rate
has continued to rise. Moreover, the danger to national existence, as we
have already indicated (Chapter I, Section. 10) is greater from moral than
from physical catastrophes, and when both catastrophes are threatened the
ultimate issue depends upon which of the two is the greater. Furthermore,
it would appear that moral catastrophes inevitably lead to physical
catastrophes. This is best illustrated by the fate of ancient Greece.
Section 4. ILLUSTRATED FROM GREEK HISTORY [Reference: Dangers]
The appositeness of this illustration arises from the fact that ancient
Greece reached a very high level of material and intellectual civilisation,
yet perished owing to moral and physical disasters.
(a) _Moral Catastrophe in Ancient Greece_
The evidence of the moral catastrophe is to be found in the change that
occurred in the Greek character most definitely after the fourth century
before Christ. Of this Mr. W. H. S. Jones has given the following account:
"Gradually the Greeks lost their brilliance, which had been as the
bright freshness of early youth. This is painfully obvious in their
literature, if not in other forms of art. Their initiative vanished;
they ceased to create and began to comment. Patriotism, with rare
exceptions, became an empty name, for few had the high spirit and
energy to translate into action man's duty to the State. Vacillation,
indecision, fitful outbursts of unhealthy activity followed by cowardly
depression, selfish cruelty, and criminal weakness are characteristic
of the public life of Greece from the struggle with Macedonia to the
final conquest by the arms of Rome. No one can fail to be struck by the
marked difference between the period from Marathon to the Peloponnesian
War and the period from Alexander to Mummius. Philosophy also suffered,
and became deeply pessimistic even in the hands of its best and noblest
exponents. 'Absence of feeling,' 'absence of care'--such were the
highest goals of human endeavour.
"How far this change was due to other causes is a complicated question.
The population may have suffered from foreign admixture during the
troubled times that followed the death of Alexander. There were,
however, many reasons against the view that these disturbances produced
any appreciable difference of race. The presence of vast numbers of
slaves, not members of households, but the gangs of toilers whom the
increase of commerce brought into the country, pandered to a foolish
pride that looked upon many kinds of honourable labour as being
shameful and unbecoming to a free man. The very institution that made
Greek civilisation possible encouraged idleness, luxury, and still
worse vices. Unnatural vice, which in some States seems to have been
positively encouraged, was prevalent among the Greeks to an almost
incredible extent. It is hard not to believe that much physical harm
was caused thereby; of the loss to moral strength and vigour there is
no need to speak. The city-state, again, however favourable to the
development of public spirit and a sense of responsibility, was doomed
to fail in a struggle against the stronger Powers of Macedon and Rome.
The growth of the scientific spirit destroyed the old religion. The
more intellectual tried to find principles of conduct in philosophy;
the ignorant or half-educated, deprived of the strong moral support
that always comes from sharing the convictions of those abler and wiser
than oneself, fell back upon degrading superstitions. In either case
there was a serious loss of that spirit of self-sacrifice and devotion
which a vigorous religious faith alone can bestow. Without such a
spirit, as history proves conclusively, no nation or people can
survive. " [57]
(b) _The Physical Catastrophe induced by Selfishness_
One of the physical catastrophes that probably most accelerated the fall
of Greek civilisation was malarial fever. The parasite of this disease is
carried from man to man by Anopheline mosquitoes. These insects, during
the stage of egg, larva, and nympha, live in water, and afterwards, as
developed insects, in the air. The breeding-grounds, where the eggs are
laid, are shallow pools of stagnant water. For that reason the disease is
most common in marshy country, and tends to disappear when the land is
properly drained. Of this we have an example in England, whence malaria
disappeared as the marshes were drained.
In Homer there is a disputed reference to malaria, but it is not possible
to ascertain whether the disease was present during the rise of Greek
civilisation, and there are no references to this disease in the literature
from 700 B. C. to 550 B. C. [58] From this date references to malaria
gradually become more frequent, and Hippocrates stated that "those who live
in low, moist, hot districts, and drink the stagnant water, of necessity
suffer from enlarged spleen. They are stunted and ill-shaped, fleshy and
dark, bilious rather than phlegmatic. Their nature is to be cowardly and
adverse from hardship; but good discipline can improve their character in
this respect. " [59] After an exhaustive study of the literature, Mr. Jones
concludes "that malaria was endemic throughout the greater part of the
Greek world by 400 B. C. "
Concerning the causes of a malarial epidemic, Sir Ronald Ross writes: [60]
"Suppose that the Anophelines have been present from the first, but that
the number of infected immigrants has been few. Then, possibly, some of
these people have happened to take up their abode in places where the
mosquitoes are rare; others may have recovered quickly; others may not have
chanced to possess parasites in suitable stages when they have been bitten.
Thus, the probability of their spreading infection would be very small. Or,
supposing even that some few new infections have been caused, yet, by our
rough calculations in section 12, _unless the mosquitoes are sufficiently
numerous_ in the locality, the little epidemic may die out after a
while--for instance, during the cool season. " The italics are mine, because
some writers have suggested that the decline of Greece was _due_ to
malaria, whereas I submit, as the more logical interpretation of the facts,
that a moral catastrophe led to the neglect of agriculture, whereby the
area of marshy land became more extensive, mosquitoes more numerous, and
the fever more prevalent.
In view of the foregoing facts, the following Malthusian statement,
although groundless, is nevertheless an amusing example of the errors that
arise from lack of a little knowledge:
"The difficulty of providing for a high birth-rate in a settled
community was appreciated by the ancient Greeks, notably by Plato and
Aristotle; but their conclusions were swept aside by the warlike spirit
of Rome, and the sentimentality of Christianity, so that only a few
isolated thinkers showed any appreciation of them. " [61]
[Footnote 51: Quoted in _The Law of Births and Deaths_, by Charles Edward
Pell, 1921, chap. xii. ]
[Footnote 52: _The Law of Births and Deaths_, 1921. ]
[Footnote 53: Ibid. , p. 40. ]
[Footnote 54: _The Law of Births and Deaths_, 1921, p. 41. ]
[Footnote 55: Ibid. , p. 40. ]
[Footnote 56: Dr. John Brownlee, _The Declining Birth-rate_, p. 156. ]
[Footnote 57: _Malaria and Greek History_, 1909, pp. 102 et seq. ]
[Footnote 58: Ibid. , p. 26. ]
[Footnote 59: Ibid. , p. 85. ]
[Footnote 60: _Report on the Prevention of Malaria in Mauritius_, p. 51. ]
[Footnote 61: C. V. Drysdale, O. B. E. , D. Sc. , _The Malthusian Doctrine and
its Modern Aspects_, p. 3. ]
CHAPTER VI
THE FALLING BIRTH-RATE IN ENGLAND: ITS CAUSES
Birth controllers claim that the fall in the English birth-rate, which
began to decline in 1876, is mostly due to the use of contraceptives: but
the very fact that this claim is made by these reckless propagandists makes
it imperative that we should scrutinise the evidence very carefully.
Section 1. NOT, AS MALTHUSIANS ASSERT, DUE MAINLY TO CONTRACEPTIVES
In support of the Malthusian contention, Dr. C. V. Drysdale, who is not a
doctor of medicine but a doctor of science, has published the following
statements:
". . . We might note that a recent investigation of the records of the
Quakers (the Society of Friends) reveals the fact that family
limitation has been adopted by them to a most astonishing extent. Their
birthrate [_sic_] stood at 20 per thousand in 1876, and has now
actually fallen to about 8 per thousand. The longevity of Quakers is
well known, and the returns of deaths given by their Society show that
the great majority live to between seventy and ninety years. Infantile
mortality is practically unknown among them, although none of the
special steps so dear to most social reformers have been taken for the
protection of infant life. The Quakers are well known to be very
earnest Christians, and to give the best example of religious morality.
Their probity in business and their self-sacrifice in humanitarian work
of all kinds are renowned. Yet it would seem that they have adopted
family restriction to a greater extent than any other body of people,
and, since the decline of their birth-rate only began in 1876, that it
is due to adoption of preventive methods. " [62]
Again, he translates the following quotation from a Swiss author:
"In France a national committee has been formed which has as its object
an agitation for the increase of the population. Upon this committee
these [? there] sit, besides President Poincaré, who, although married,
has no children, twenty-four senators and littérateurs. These
twenty-five persons, who preach to their fellow citizens by word and
pen, have between them nineteen children, or not one child on the
average per married couple. Similarly, a Paris journal
(_Intransigeant_, August and September, 1908) had the good idea of
publishing four hundred and forty-five names of the chief Parisian
personalities who are never tired of lending their names in support of
opposition to the artificial restriction of families. I give these
figures briefly without the names, which have no special interest for
us. Anyone interested in the names can consult the paper well known in
upper circles. Among them:
176 married couples had 0 children = 0 children
106 " " " 1 child = 106 "
88 " " " 2 children = 176 "
40 " " " 3 " = 120 "
19 " " " 4 " = 76 "
7 " " " 5 " = 35 "
4 " " " 6 " = 24 "
3 " " " 7 " = 21 "
1 " " " 9 " = 9 "
1 " " " 11 " = 11 "
Total 445 with 578
That is, an average one and a third children per couple, while each
single one of these families could much more easily have supported
twenty children than a working-class family a single child. "
"Comment on the above is superfluous," adds Dr. C. V. Drysdale, and with
that remark most people will cordially disagree. The obvious interpretation
of the foregoing figures is that there has been a decline in natural
fertility amongst highly educated and civilised people. But that
interpretation does not suit Dr. Drysdale's book, and hence we have the
disgraceful spectacle of a writer who, in order to bolster up an argument
which is rotten from beginning to end, does not hesitate to launch without
a particle of evidence a charge of gross hypocrisy against the Quakers of
England, a body of men and women who in peace and in war have proved the
sincerity of their faith, and against four hundred and seventy respected
citizens of Paris. Further comment on _that_ is superfluous. At the same
time it is obvious that, in so far as their pernicious propaganda spreads
and is adopted, Malthusians may claim to contribute to the fall of the
birth-rate, and towards the decline of the Empire.
Section 2. DECLINE IN FERTILITY DUE TO SOME NATURAL LAW
In the course of an inquiry on the fertility of women who had received a
college education, the National Birth Rate Commission [63] attempted to
discover to what extent birth control was practised amongst the middle and
professional classes. Of those amongst whom the inquiry was made 477 gave
definite answers, from which it was ascertained that 289, or 60 per cent. ,
consciously limited their families, or attempted to do so; and that 188,
or 40 per cent. made no attempt to limit their families. Amongst those who
limited their families 183 stated the means employed, and of these, 105,
or 57 per cent. , practised continence, whilst 78, or 43 per cent. , used
artificial or unnatural methods.
Now comes a most extraordinary fact. Dr. Major Greenwood, [64] a
statistician whose methods are beyond question, discovered that there was
no real mathematical difference between the number of children in the
"limited" families and the number in the unlimited families. In both groups
of families the number of children was smaller than the average family in
the general population, and in both groups there were fewer children than
in the families of the preceding generation to which the parents belonged.
Dr. Greenwood states that this is _prima facie_ evidence that deliberate
birth control has produced little effect, and that the lowered fertility is
the expression of a natural change. Nevertheless, he holds that the latter
explanation cannot be accepted as wholly proved on the evidence, owing to
certain defects in the data on which his calculations were based.
"I am of opinion that we should hesitate before adopting that
interpretation in view of the cogent indirect evidence afforded by
other data that the fall of the birth-rate is differential, and that
the differentiation is largely economic. There are at least two
considerations which must be borne in mind in connection with these
schedules. The first is, that all the marriages described as unlimited
may not have been so. I do not suggest that the answers are
intentionally false, but it is possible that many may have considered
that limitation implied the use of mechanical means; that marriages in
which the parties merely abstained from, _or limited the occasions of_,
sexual intercourse may have frequently entered as of unrestricted
fertility. "
The above italics are mine, because, if that surmise be correct, it goes
to prove that the restriction of intercourse to certain periods, which
restriction the married may lawfully practise, is as efficacious in
limiting the size of a family as are those artificial methods of birth
control contrary both to natural and to Christian morality. Dr. Major
Greenwood continues as follows:
"In the second place, the schedules do not provide us with information
as to when limitation was introduced. We are told, for instance, that
the size of the family was five and that its number was limited. This
may mean _either_ that throughout the duration of the marriage
preventive measures were adopted from time to time, _or_ that _after_
five children had been born fertile intercourse was stopped. In the
absence of detailed information on this point it is plainly impossible
to form an accurate judgment as to the effect of limitation. "
There are, therefore, no accurate figures to indicate the extent to which
birth control has contributed to the decline in the birth-rate.
Section 3. AND TO CHARACTER OF OCCUPATION
Moreover the claim of birth controllers, that the decline in the English
birth-rate is mainly due to the use of contraceptives, is rendered highly
improbable by the fact that the Registrar-General [65] has shown that in
1911 the birth-rate in different classes varied according to the occupation
of the fathers. The figures are these:
Births per 1,000 married
Social Class. males aged under 55, including
retired.
1. Unskilled workmen 213
2. Intermediate class 158
3. Skilled workmen 153
4. Intermediate 132
5. Upper and middle class 119
Thus, ascending the social scale, we find, in class upon class, that as the
annual income increases the number of children in the family diminishes,
until we come to the old English nobility of whom, according to Darwin, 19
per cent. are childless. These last have every reason to wish for heirs to
inherit their titles and what land and wealth they possess, and, as their
record in war proves them to be no cowards' breed, it would be a monstrous
indictment to maintain that their childlessness is mostly due to the use
of contraceptives. If _all_ these results arose from the practice of
birth control, it would imply a crescendo of general national selfishness
unparalleled in the history of humanity. No, it is not possible to give
Neo-Malthusians credit, even for all the evil they claim to have achieved.
Section 4. AGGRAVATED DOUBTLESS BY MALTHUSIANISM
Nevertheless, artificial birth control is an evil and too prevalent thing.
My contention is that the primary cause of our falling birth-rate is
over-civilisation; one of the most evil products of this over-civilisation,
whereby simple, natural, and unselfish ideals, based on the assumption that
national security depends on the moral and economic strength of family
life, have been replaced largely by a complicated, artificial, and
luxurious individualism; and that diminished fertility, apart from
the practice of artificial birth control, is a result of luxurious
individualism. Even if it be so, one of the most evil products of
over-civilisation is the use of contraceptives, because this practice, more
than any other factor in social life, hastens, directly and indirectly, the
fall of a declining birth-rate; and artificial birth control, to the extent
to which it is practised, therefore aggravates the consequences of a law of
decline already apparent in our midst. I have already said that restriction
of intercourse, as held lawful by the Catholic Church, is possibly as
efficacious in limiting the size of a family as are artificial methods.
If any man shall say that therefore there is no difference between these
methods, let him read the fuller explanation given in another connection on
p. 153. (See [Reference: Explanation]) The method which reason and morality
alike permit is devoid of all those evils, moral, psychological, and
physiological, that follow the use of contraceptives.
[Footnote 62: _The Small Family System_, pp. 195 and 160, New York, 1917. ]
[Footnote 63: _The Declining Birth-rate_, p. 323. ]
[Footnote 64: _The Declining Birth-rate_, p. 324. ]
[Footnote 65: _The Declining Birth-rate_, p. 9. ]
CHAPTER VII
THE EVILS OF ARTIFICIAL BIRTH CONTROL
Section 1. NOT A PHYSICAL BENEFIT
Birth control is alleged to be beneficial for men and women, and these
"benefits" are no less amazing than the fallacies on which this practice
is advocated. At the Obstetric Section of the Royal Society of Medicine
in 1921 the leading physicians on diseases of women condemned the use of
contraceptives. [66]
_A Cause of Sterility_
Dr. R. A. Gibbons, Physician to the Grosvenor Hospital for Women, said
that nowadays it was common for a young married woman to ask her
medical man for advice as to the best method of preventing conception.
The test of relative sterility was the rapidity with which conception
takes place. He had made confidential inquiries in 120 marriages. In
100 cases preventive measures had been used at one time or another, and
the number of children was well under 2 per marriage. In Paris some
time ago the birth-rate was 104 per 1,000 in the poorer quarters and
only 34 in a rich quarter of the city; in London comparative figures
had been given as 195 and 63 in poor and in rich quarters. These and
similar figures showed that women living in comfort and luxury did not
want to be bothered with confinements. It had been said that the degree
of sterility could be regarded as an index to the morals of a race.
Congenital sterility was rare, but the number of children born in
England was decreasing. It had been estimated that one-third of the
pregnancies in several great cities abroad aborted. Dr. Gibbons then
quoted figures given by Douglas Wight and Amand Routh to show the high
percentage of abortions and stillbirths. In his opinion it was the duty
of medical men to point out to the public that physiological laws could
not be broken with impunity. It had been observed that if the doe were
withheld from the buck at oestral periods atrophy of the ovary took
place. In this connection Dr. Gibbons recalled a large number of
patients who had used contraceptives in early married life, and
subsequently had longed in vain for a child. This applied also to those
who had decided, after the first baby, to have no more children, and
had subsequently regretted their decision.
_Neuroses_
Professor McIlroy, of the London School of Medicine for Women, deplored
the amount of time spent on attempting to cure sterility when
contraceptives were so largely used. The fact that neuroses were
largely the result of the use of contraceptives should be made widely
known, and also that in women the maternal passion was even stronger,
though it might develop later, than sexual passion, and would
ultimately demand satisfaction.
_Fibroid Tumours_
Dr. Arthur E. Giles, Senior Surgeon to the Chelsea Hospital for Women,
endorsed Dr. Gibbons's remarks as to the great unhappiness resulting
from deliberately childless marriages, and he added that he had always
warned patients of this. He believed that quinine had a permanently bad
effect. Those who waited for a convenient season to have a child often
laid up trouble for themselves. On the question of fibroid tumours he
had come to the conclusion that these were not a cause but in a sense a
consequence of sterility. Women who were subjected to sexual excitement
with no physiological outlet appear to have a tendency to develop
fibroids. He would like the opinion to go forth from the section that
the use of contraceptives was a bad thing.
All these authorities are agreed that the practice of artificial sterility
during early married life is the cause of many women remaining childless,
although later on these women wish in vain for children. To meet this
difficulty one of the advocates of birth control advises all young couples
to make sure of some children before adopting these practices; thus
demanding of young parents, at the very time when it is most irksome, that
very sacrifice of personal comfort and prosperity to prevent which is the
precise object of the vicious practice. Nor is sterility the only penalty.
The disease known as neurasthenia arises both in women _and in men_ in
consequence of these methods. Dr. Mary Sharlieb, [67] after forty years'
experience of diseases of women, writes as follows:
"Now, on the surface of things, it would seem as if a knowledge of how
to prevent the too rapid increase of a family would be a boon to
over-prolific and heavily burdened mothers. There are, however, certain
reasons which probably convert the supposed advantage into a very real
disadvantage. An experience of well over forty years convinces me that
the artificial limitation of the family causes damage to a woman's
nervous system. The damage done is likely to show itself in inability
to conceive when the restriction voluntarily used is abandoned because
the couple desire offspring.
"I have for many years asked women who came to me desiring children
whether they have ever practised prevention, and they very frequently
tell me that they did so during the early days of their married life
because they thought that their means were not adequate to the support
of a family. Subsequently they found that conception, thwarted at the
time that desire was present, fails to occur when it becomes
convenient. In such cases, even although examination of the pelvic
organ shows nothing abnormal, all one's endeavours to secure conception
frequently go unrewarded. Sometimes such a woman is not only sterile,
but nervous, and in generally poor health; but the more common
occurrence is that she remains fairly well until the time of the change
of life, when she frequently suffers more, on the nervous side, than
does the woman who has lived a natural married life. "
The late Dr. F. W. Taylor, President of the British Gynaecological Society,
wrote as follows in 1904:
"Artificial prevention is an evil and a disgrace. The immorality of it,
the degradation of succeeding generations by it, their domination or
subjection by strangers who are stronger because they have not given
way to it, the curses that must assuredly follow the parents of
decadence who started it,--all of this needs to be brought home to the
minds of those who have thoughtlessly or ignorantly accepted it, for it
is to this undoubtedly that we have to attribute not only the
diminishing birth-rate, but the diminishing value of our population.
"It would be strange indeed if so unnatural a practice, one so
destructive of the best life of the nation, should bring no danger or
disease in its wake, and I am convinced, after many years of
observation, that both sudden danger and chronic disease may be
produced by the methods of prevention very generally employed. . . . The
natural deduction is that the artificial production of modern times,
the relatively sterile marriage, is an evil thing, even to the
individuals primarily concerned, injurious not only to the race, but to
those who accept it. "
That was the opinion of a distinguished gynaecologist, who also happened
to be a Christian. The reader may protest that the latter fact is entirely
irrelevant to my argument, and that the value of a man's observations
concerning disease is to be judged by his skill and experience as a
physician, and not by his religious beliefs. A most reasonable statement.
Unhappily, the Neo-Malthusians think otherwise. They would have us believe
that because this man was a Christian his opinion, as a gynaecologist, is
worthless. C. V. Drysdale, O. B. E. , D. Sc. , after quoting Dr. Taylor's views,
adds the following foot-note:
"I have since learnt that Dr. Taylor was a very earnest Christian, and
the author of several sacred hymns and of a pious work, _The Coming of
the Saints_. " [68]
Furthermore, in 1905, the South-Western Branch of the British Medical
Association passed the following resolution:
"That this Branch is of opinion that the growing use of contraceptives
and ecbolics is fraught with great danger both to the individual and to
the race. That this Branch is of opinion that the advertisements and
sale of such appliances and substances, as well as the publication and
dissemination of literature relating thereto, should be made a penal
offence. " [69]
Section 2. A SCANDALOUS SUGGESTION
The foregoing opinions are very distasteful to Neo-Malthusians, and these
people, being unable apparently to give a reasoned answer, do not hesitate
to suggest that medical opposition, when not due to religious bias, is
certainly due to mercenary motives.
"As the Church has a vested interest in souls, so the medical
profession has a vested interest in bodies. Birth is a source of
revenue, direct and indirect. It means maternity fees first; it
generally presupposes preliminary medical treatment of the expectant
mother; and it provides a new human being to be a patient to some
member of the profession, humanly certain to have its share of
infantile diseases, and likely, if it survives them, to produce
children of its own before the final death-bed attendance is
reached. " [70]
That scandalous suggestion has recently been repeated by the President of
the Society for Constructive Birth Control and Racial Progress under the
following circumstances. On October 31, 1921, the _Sussex Daily News_
published the following paragraph from its London correspondent.
"BIRTH CONTROL
"Reverberations of Lord Dawson's recent sensational address to the
Church Congress on birth control are still being felt as well in
medical as in clerical circles. Indeed, the subject has been discussed
by the lawyers at Gray's Inn. The London Association of the Medical
Women's Federation had so animated a discussion on it that it was
decided to continue it at the next meeting. It is quite evident that
Lord Dawson did not speak for a united medical profession. Indeed,
quite a number of doctors of all creeds are attacking the new Birth
Control Society. A London physician has a pamphlet on the subject in
the Press, and the controversy rages fiercely in the neighbourhood of
'birth-control' clinics. Much is likely to be made of the example of
France, where the revolt against the practices advocated is now in full
swing, and strong legal measures have been taken and are in
contemplation. French medical opinion is said to be very pronounced on
the subject, and it has, of course, a great deal of clinical experience
to back it. "
On November 8, a second paragraph appeared:
"BIRTH CONTROL
"My remark recently that 'a number of doctors of all creeds are
attacking the new Birth-Control Society' has been challenged by the
hon. secretary of the body in question, who observes that I am
misinformed. I must adhere to my statement, which was a record of
personal observation. Many doctors have spoken to me on the subject,
and their opinions on the ethics of birth control differ widely; but I
can only remember one who did not attack this particular society. The
secretary suggests that I am confusing what his society advocates with
something else. As a matter of fact, the whole question of birth
control has been discussed more than once by medical bodies. A doctor
who attended one such discussion shortly after the opening of the
clinic in Holloway told me that, while there was division of opinion on
the general subject, the feeling of the meeting was overwhelming
against the particular teaching given at the clinic, as undesirable and
actively mischievous. The subject is controversial, and I profess to do
no more than record such opinions as are current. "
On November 17 the _Sussex Daily News_ published the following letter:
"CONSTRUCTIVE BIRTH CONTROL
"Sir,--Your recent paragraph of 'opinions' about the Mothers' Clinic
and the Society for Constructive Birth Control and Racial Progress is
not only extremely unrepresentative, but grossly misleading. Your
writer says that he can only remember one doctor who did not attack
this particular society. This implies that the medical profession is
against it, which is absolutely untrue, as is quite evident from the
fact that we have three of the most distinguished medical men in Great
Britain on our list of Vice-Presidents; four others, also very
distinguished, on our Research Committee; and that Dr. E. B. Turner, in
a Press interview after the recent Church Congress, singled out
Constructive Birth Control as the only 'Control' which was not
mischievous.
"_That there may be medical men who do not approve of birth control is
natural, when one remembers that a doctor has to make his living, and
can do so more easily when women are ailing with incessant pregnancies
than when they maintain themselves in good health by only having
children when fitted to do so. Opinions of medicals, therefore, must be
sifted. The best doctors are with us; the self-seeking and the biassed
may be against us_.
"Details about the society, including the manifesto signed by a series
of the most distinguished persons, can be obtained on application to
the Honorary Secretary, at . . . London, N. 19. --Yours, etc.
"MARIE C. STOPES,
"President Society for Constructive and Racial Progress. "
The italics are mine, and they draw attention to a disgraceful statement
concerning the medical profession. As the reader is aware, certain members
of our profession approve of artificial birth control. What, I ask, would
be the opinion of the general public, and of my friends, if I were so
distraught as to suggest that these men approved of birth control because
they had a financial interest in the sale of contraceptives? That
suggestion would be as reckless and as wicked as the statement made by Dr.
Marie C. Stopes. In the _British Medical Journal_ of November 26 I quoted,
without comment, the above italicised paragraph as her opinion of the
medical profession, and on December 10 the following reply from the lady
appeared:
"Your two correspondents, Dr. Halliday Sutherland and Dr. Binnie
Dunlop, by quoting paragraphs without their full context, appear to
lend support to views which by implication are, to some extent,
detrimental to my own. This method of controversy has never appealed to
me, but in the interests of the society with which I am associated, I
must be allowed to answer the implications. The paragraph quoted by Dr.
Sutherland is not, as would appear from his letter, a simple opinion of
mine on the medical profession, but was written in reply to a rather
scurrilous paragraph so worded as to lead the public to believe that
the medical profession as a whole was against the Society for
Constructive Birth Control and Racial Progress. My answer, which
appeared not only in the papers quoted but in others, contained the
following statement: 'We have three of the most distinguished medical
men in Great Britain on our list of Vice-Presidents; four others, also
very distinguished, on our Research Committee. ' Reading these words
before the paragraph your correspondent quotes, and taking all in
conjunction with an attack implying that the entire medical profession
was against us, it is obvious that the position is rather different
from what readers of Dr. Sutherland's letter in your issue of November
26 might suppose. "
It will be noted that Dr. Stopes does not withdraw but attempts to justify
her scandalous suggestion by stating, firstly, that the full context of her
letter was not quoted by me, and secondly, that her original letter was
written "in reply to a rather scurrilous paragraph. "
As I have now quoted in full her original letter, excepting the address
of her society, and the two paragraphs from the _Sussex Daily News_, my
readers may form their own judgment on the following points: Is it possible
to maintain that the whole context of her original letter puts a different
complexion on her remarks concerning the medical profession? Can either
of the paragraphs from the _Sussex Daily News_ be truthfully described
as "rather scurrilous," or are they fair comment on a matter of public
interest? Moreover, even if a daily paper _had_ published a misleading
paragraph about this society, surely that is not a valid reason why its
President should make a malignant attack, not on journalists, but on the
medical profession?
Section 3. A CAUSE OF UNHAPPINESS IN MARRIAGE
Nor does birth control lead to happiness in marriage. On the contrary,
experience shows that the practice is injurious not only to the bodies
but also to the minds of men and women. As no method of contraception is
infallible, the wife who allows or adopts it may find herself in the truly
horrible position of being secretly or openly suspected of infidelity.
Again, when a family has been limited to one or two children and these die,
the parents may find themselves solitary and childless in old age; and
mothers thus bereaved are often the victims of profound and lasting
melancholy. The mother of a large family has her worries, many of them not
due to her children, but to the social evils of our time: and yet she is
less to be pitied than the woman who is losing her beauty after a fevered
life of, vanity and self-indulgence, and who has no one to love her, not
even a child.
Moreover, these practices have an influence on the relation between husband
and wife, on their emotions towards each other and towards the whole sexual
nisus. Mr. Bernard Shaw recently stated [71] that when people adopt methods
of birth control they are engaging, not in sexual intercourse, but in
reciprocal masturbation.
That is the plain truth of the matter. Or, from another point of view, it
may be said that the man who adopts these practices is simply using his
wife as he would use a prostitute, as indeed was said long ago by St.
Thomas Aquinas. [72] The excuse offered for illicit sexual intercourse is
not usually pleasure, but that the sex impulse is irresistible: and the
same argument is used for conjugal union with prevention. In both cases the
natural result of union is not desired, and positive means are taken to
prevent it.
And what of the results on the mutual love, if an old-fashioned word be
not now out of place, and on the self-respect of two people so associated?
Birth control cannot make for happiness, because it means that mutual love
is at the mercy of an animal instinct, neither satisfied nor denied. It is
an old truth that those who seek happiness for itself never find it. And
yet the advocates of birth control have the temerity to claim that these
practices lead to happiness. I presume that of the bliss following marriage
with contraceptives the crowded lists of our divorce courts are an index.
The marriage bond is weakened when a common lasting interest in the care
of children is replaced by transient sexual excitement. Once pregnancy is
abolished there is no natural check on the sexual passions of husband or
wife, for they have learnt how sexual desire may be gratified without the
pain, publicity, and responsibility of having children. In the experience
of the world marriages based merely on passion are seldom happy, and
artificial birth control means passion uncontrolled by nature. These
methods are not practised by nations such as Ireland and Spain, who accept
the moral rule of the natural law expressed in God's commandments and
sanctioned by His judgments; and no man who has ever lived in these
countries could truthfully maintain that the people there, on whom the
burdens of marriage press as elsewhere, are in reality anxious to obtain
facilities for divorce. On the other hand, there are many who allege that
the people of England are shouting out for greater facilities for divorce
than they now possess. At any rate, it is obvious enough that there are
those amongst us who are straining every nerve to force such facilities
upon them.
Section 4. AN INSULT TO TRUE WOMANHOOD
It has been said that patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel; and
apparently chivalry is the last refuge of a fool. Some of the advocates of
birth control who have never thought the matter out, either passionately or
dispassionately, claim to speak on behalf of women. They protest that "many
women of the educated classes revolt against the drudgery, anxieties,
inconveniences, disease, and disfigurements which attend the yearly
child-bearing advocated by the moralist. " [73]
What moralist? Who ever said it? Again, they plead for women who "revolt"
from the "disfigurement" of the gestation period. The great artist
Botticelli did not think this was disfigurement. What true women do? Are
they not those of whom Kipling writes, "as pale and as stale as a bone"?
And, if so, are these unworthy specimens of their sex worth tears? The vast
majority of women bear the discomforts of gestation and the actual perils
and pangs of birth with exemplary fortitude: and it is a gross slander for
anyone to maintain that a few cowardly and degenerate individuals really
represent that devoted sex. But these writers are indeed well out of the
ruck of ordinary humanity, because they tell us that "whatever the means
employed, and whether righteous or not, the propensity to limit the highest
form of life operates silently and steadily amongst the more thoughtful
members of all civilized countries," and yet add that "it is not perhaps
good taste to consider the means employed to this end. " While they thus
approve and commend the practice of birth control as natural to "the
more thoughtful members," they nevertheless question the "good taste" of
discussing the very methods of which they approve, even in the columns of a
medical journal! Again, they tell us that "assuredly continence is not, and
never will be, the principal" method. That may be possibly true, so long as
Christianity is more professed than practised; God knows we are all lacking
enough in self-control. And yet throughout the ages moralists have preached
the advantages of self-control, and we ordinary men and women know that we
could do better, and that others who have gone before us have done better;
but it is the self-styled "thoughtful members" who proclaim to the world
that self-control in matters of sex is an impossibility, and therefore not
to be even attempted. They are no common people--these epicureans, selfish
even in their refinement. In addition to losing their morals, they have
certainly lost their wits.
Section 5. A DEGRADATION OF THE FEMALE SEX
In the Neo-Malthusian propaganda there is yet another fact which--should
be seized by every married woman, because it is a clear indication of a
tendency to reduce women to degrading subjection. No recommendations of
limited intercourse or of self-restraint according to the dictates
of reason or of affection are to be found in the writings of birth
controllers. Unrestrained indulgence, without the risk of consequences, is
their motto. To this end they advocate certain contraceptive methods, and
the reader should note that these methods require precautions to be taken
solely by the woman. If she fails to take these precautions, or if the
precautions themselves fail, all responsibility for the occurrence of
conception rests on her alone; because her Malthusian masters have decided
that she alone is to be, made responsible for preventing the natural or
possible consequences of intercourse. Why? That is a very interesting
question, and one to which a leading Neo-Malthusian has given the answer.
In 1854 there was published, _Physical, Sexual and Natural Religion: by a
Graduate of Medicine_. In the third edition the title was altered to _The
Elements of Social Science_, and the author's pseudonym to _A Doctor of
Medicine_. This book, which contains over 600 pages of small type, may be
truthfully described as the Bible of Neo-Malthusians, and includes, under
the curious heading _Sexual Religion_, a popular account of all venereal
and other diseases of sex. In the Preface to the first edition, [74] the
anonymous author states: "Had it not been the fear of causing pain to a
relation, I should have felt it my duty to put my name to this work; in
order that any censure passed upon it should fall upon myself alone. " The
relation appears to have had a long life, because anonymity was preserved
for fifty years, presumably out of respect for his, or her, feelings: and
he, or she, must have lived as long as the author, who died in 1904 at the
age of seventy-eight; because the author's name was not revealed until a
posthumous edition, the thirty-fifth, appeared in 1905, from which we learn
that the book was written by the late Dr. George Drysdale, brother of
the first President of the Malthusian League, and uncle of the present
incumbent. The last edition, in recompense for its smudgy type, contains a
most welcome announcement by the publisher:
"PUBLISHER'S NOTE. --. . . It is due alike to the reader and the publisher
to explain why the present edition is printed (in the main) from
stereotypes that have seen fifty years' service. The cost of resetting
the work would be prohibitive on the basis of present (and probable
future) sales. To some extent the plates have been repaired; but such
an expedient can do no more than remove the worse causes of offence. "
But the fact with which I am at present concerned is that in every edition
all contraceptive methods that apply to the male are _condemned_ for the
following reasons:
"The first of these modes [_coitus interruptus_] is physically
injurious, and is apt to produce nervous disorder and sexual
enfeeblement and congestion, from the sudden interruption it gives to
the venereal act, whose _pleasure_ moreover it interferes with. The
second, namely the sheath, _dulls the enjoyment_, and frequently
produces impotence in the man and disgust in both parties; so that it
also is injurious" (p. 349). . . . "Any preventive means, to be
satisfactory, must be used by the woman, as _it spoils the passion and
the impulsiveness_ of the venereal act _if the man have to think of
them_" (p. 350).
The italics are mine, but the following comments are by a woman, who was
moreover the first woman to qualify in medicine--the late Dr. Elizabeth
Blackwell.
"Here, in this chief teacher of the Neo-Malthusians, the cloven foot is
fully revealed. This popular author, who in many parts of his book
denounces marriage as the enslavement of men and women, who sneers at
continence, and rages at Christianity as a vanishing superstition--all
under a special pretence of benevolence and desire for the advancement
of the human race, here clearly, shows what he is aiming at, and what
his doctrines lead to. Male sexual pleasure must not be interfered
with, male lust may be indulged in to any extent that pleasure demands,
but woman must take the entire responsibility, that male indulgence be
not disturbed by any inconvenient claims from paternity. Whatever
consequences ensue the woman is to blame, and must bear the whole
responsibility.
"A doctrine more diabolical in its theory and more destructive in its
practical consequences has never been invented. This is the doctrine of
Neo-Malthusianism.
