The unwelcome child

Dear Friend:

In my last, I showed, at some length, the crime of an undesired maternity against the mother; how it affects her mind towards the father of her child; how it tends to destroy all love and respect for him, instead of increasing them; how it destroys her self-respect, strips her of the conscious pride and dignity of a loved and loving wife, and reduces her to the feeling and condition of a degraded, self-condemned victim of legalized sensualism. She feels polluted, degraded, outraged; and that, too, through the very function of her nature, which should have filled and thrilled her soul with conscious pride and happiness.

The Crime against the Child.—Allow me now to direct your attention to this. Let the child of an undesigned and unwilling maternity arise before your mind. Ponder what life is, and how it is affected by birthright tendencies,—physical, intellectual and spiritual; see what a struggle it is, at best, and how difficult it is for those of the soundest bodies and healthiest souls, happily and successfully to meet the conflict. Call to mind the two great facts alluded to in a former letter, viz.: (1) That whatever comes to the child before birth, must come to it through the blood and organism of the mother. (2) That, as this substance passes through her system, it must receive the impress of her physical and mental conditions. Whatever temporarily affects her conditions, must permanently affect the character and destiny of her child.

You may grievously wrong your child, and subject it to physical and mental tendencies that may deeply affect its character and happiness, during its earthly existence, by subjecting it to the liability of inheriting the unhealthy and imbecile conditions in which you and the mother may be, at the time the relation was held in which it originated. Mere sensual gratification was the sole and single motive that prompted to the relation; and even in that, your wife had no part. Her heart, it may be, not only prayed against conception, as a calamity more to be dreaded than death, but this very horror of the consequences disqualified her to participate in the relation, when it was entirely mutual, and truly and rightly prompted. Her very soul shrank from it; and she submitted to it merely to gratify you, or because she had been taught to believe it a duty incumbent on all women who enter the married relation,—a duty to which she must submit, or be accounted a faithless wife,—regardless of the wishes of her husband, and false to her obligations as a wife.

Duty! Talk of duty in such a relation! A duty for a woman to submit to such a relation, when her own soul not only does not sanction, but loathes it! A duty in a woman thus to lay her health, her self-respect, and her very womanhood, on the altar of legalized sensualism! A duty to become a prostitute,—a mere tool of her husband’s gratification! It is a horrid mockery! As well talk to her of her duty to cut her throat! No man, but a sensualist, could ever accept the surrender of a woman’s person in such relation, when he knows it is made without any call in her own nature, and merely to satisfy his passion.

Your only object, it may be, in this relation, is mere sensual indulgence. Not one thought or care for the welfare of the child that may ensue enters your mind. Consequently, you are utterly indifferent to your physical or mental conditions, at the time. Your passion being excited, your only aim is, its gratification. Your wife may be in a state of utter prostration, physically and mentally,—severe toil, deep anxiety, sad disappointment, or some torturing care, may have exhausted her energies, and reduced her to a state of imbecility, for the time being. Despite all this, she is liable to conception. You heed not her conditions nor her wishes, but demand indulgence, regardless of her happiness or that of the child which may result therefrom. She submits, rather than contend. Maternity ensues. The mother imparts no vitality to the child in its conception. It is conceived in weakness, is developed in joyless, lifeless imbecility, or intense anguish. It is born an idiot, or without sufficient vital force to develop it into life with the ordinary energies and faculties of a man or woman.

On all hands, society is full of the victims of such a relation,—of a maternity forced on woman when, from various causes, body and soul are prostrated, and too destitute of vital energy even for the ordinary demands of daily life; how much more destitute of that fulness and vigor of life, so necessary to the sublime and responsible act of true and healthy conception! If ever the current of life should flow with deep, concentrated, joyous energy in woman, it should be in the moment of conception, when she takes charge of the germ of a new and immortal life, and enters upon the sublime and overwhelming responsibilities of maternity. Then, indeed, she needs that all the energies of her womanhood should be in most perfect and healthful activity; then, if ever, she should be filled “with all the fulness of God.”

But not only are the vital forces of your wife exhausted by other labors and anxieties, but your own energies are, from various causes, prostrated. Yet, excited by some artificial stimulant, and when the vital forces of your manhood are powerless, you demand this relation with your wife. Maternity is the result. What have you done for your child? Imparted to it, not the true life and vigor of your manhood, but its momentary imbecility. Your child, it may be, is rendered imbecile in body and idiotic in mind, solely through your fault. You exhausted your life, and then gave that exhausted, soulless life to your child. You exercised no wise and manly forethought for your child. Its well-being entered not into your designs; only your own gratification. Hence, for your child’s sake, you used no exertions, by abstinence from exhausting toil or enfeebling amusements and indulgences, to exalt and perfect your physical and mental energies; but by debilitating pleasures, by sleepless nights, spent in pursuit of amusement, by dissipating games, and by exhausting indulgences in the use of narcotic and alcoholic drugs, drinks and food, you are rendered imbecile to think, to feel, or to act. And these conditions you entail on your child as its birthright, lifelong, fearful legacy, from the effects of which no power can rescue it. Can you do a greater wrong to your child? Can you commit against it a greater crime? A living death is its doom.

When should man be a living soul, if not in that relation in which he originates a new immortal? In that moment, so replete with human destiny, if ever, every nerve of his being should be filled and thrilled with that creative energy, that concentrated, vitalizing power which said, “Let there be light, and there was light;” and which says of creation, “He spake, and it was done; he commanded, and it stood fast.” So man, in that moment of sublime consecration of his manhood to its purest and most august function, should have a great, energetic, living soul, in a living body. He performs an act of deeper significance than that which gave existence and glory to the sun and stars—an act, from which is to arise a living soul, deathless as God in its being, and capable of reaching unimaginable heights of wisdom and love.

Your child has claims which you cannot, without injustice, ignore,—claims that reach beyond its birth, and even its conception. Its first claim is, to a designed existence, if it is to exist at all. Only in such an existence can it hope for a true and noble nature. Only in a relation, designed to give existence to a well-organized child, can you exercise a true, rational, and tender forethought for your offspring. The offspring of a relation held merely for the gratification of one or both parents, of a mere chance maternity, how can it but reflect with sorrow and bitterness on the wrong of its parents? The child, as it comes to years of reflection, feels degraded in its origin. No lofty aspirations, no tender love, no animating hopes, no earnest prayer, no deep, holy longings, no vitalizing joy, no conscious pride and dignity, no God, presided over the relation in which it originated; but shrinking disgust in one parent, and brutal sensuality, and indifference to its welfare, in the other. No Gloria in Excelsis was sung by angels or men over its conception or birth; but sensualism, shame, anguish, and, it may be, curses deep and bitter, attended its entrance into life. What must a child, as it grows to maturity, think of an existence thus begun, and of those who could trifle with the deepest and most potent memories of the past in their offspring? Would you thus live in the hearts of your children? If not, then do them not this foul wrong. On your part, let the existence of your child be a designed and a longed-for existence. What proportion of cases of maternity result from a relation held with a view to the development of a child? Few, very few, compared to the number born. The relation was held without any wish or design to have a child; but solely with a view to sensual gratification. Consequently, the child must inherit, to some extent, the conditions the parents happen to be in at the moment. The child is robbed of a pure, true, thoughtful birthright, and is the offspring of reckless, selfish passion, rather than of a tender, anxious, thoughtful and far-seeing love. Never subject your wife to the possibility of a maternity which, on your part, is undesigned, and, on her part, undesired. Your reward will be great and sure, in the ever-growing love and respect of your wife, in the healthful and harmonious organization and upward tendencies of your children, and in the consciousness of an ever-growing tenderness and nobleness of manhood in yourself.

The power of the mother over the child, after birth, is conceded to be great; what, then, must it be before? Who can estimate it? Reasoning from the facts I have stated, we should conclude it to be absolute, and without limit. For good or for evil, it must be great. The organic and constitutional tendencies of body and soul to health or disease, to good or evil, are settled previous to birth. The character and destiny of the future man or woman depend, essentially, on those ante-natal tendencies. These depend on the influences that are brought to bear on the child during that period. Whatever agencies bear, injuriously or otherwise, on the mother, must control the unborn child with greater and more permanent effect. What influence has an abhorred maternity on the conditions of the mother? It must be great; but great as it is, it is still greater and more abiding on the child. Its post-natal life will be more affected by those ante-natal influences, than by all that are brought to bear on it after its birth. The crime against the mother is great, but the crime against the child is greater, and more enduring and terrible in its consequences.

When maternity is imposed on your wife without her consent, and contrary to her appeal, how will her mind necessarily be affected towards her child? It was conceived in dread, and in bitterness of spirit. Every stage of its fœtal development is watched with a feeling of settled repugnance. In every step of its ante-natal progress, the child meets only with grief and indignation in the mother. She would crush out its life, if she could. She loathed its conception; she loathed it in every stage of its ante-natal development. She cannot love and cherish it, for nought, it may be, is associated with its existence, from the beginning, but pain and sorrow. Tender, cherishing, vitalizing love does not preside over its conception and development, but grief and anguish. Instead of fixing her mind on devising ways and means for the healthful and happy organization and development of her child, before it is born, and for its post-natal comfort and support, her soul is intent on its destruction, and her thoughts devise plans to kill it.

In this, how often is she aided by others! There are those, and they are called men and women, whose profession is to devise ways to kill children before they are born. Those who do this would not hesitate to kill them after they are born; for the state of mind that would justify and instigate ante-natal child-murder, would justify and instigate post-natal child-murder. Yet, public sentiment consigns the murderer of post-natal children to the dungeon or the gallows; while the murderers of ante-natal children are often allowed to pass in society as honest and honorable men and women.

The unwelcome child is ever before the mother. She regards it as a sacrilegious intruder into the domain of her life; an invader of the holy of holies of her being. She had never called for it; it was thrust upon her, as it were, by fraud and violence. Besides, it is the child of one whom this very outrage has caused her to dread or despise. The child is ever present to her, not as a pledge of love, an answer to the earnest prayer of her wifely soul, as a source of living joy and ennobling hopes; but as a witness of her shame and degradation, and of the great wrong done her by its father, and by one whom she had loved and trusted, but to be betrayed. She meets her innocent, unconscious babe, at every step of its ante-natal development, with a frown, and beats it back with threats and weapons of death.

What makes that mother feel so towards her unborn babe? It is to her an unwelcome child. Maternity is thrust upon her before she is prepared for it. Her body shrinks from the suffering it brings to her; her soul sanctions not, but abhors, its existence. God, speaking through the body and soul of that mother, frowns on its conception, its development, and its birth. Its mother, and the God of its mother, are conspiring against the health, the happiness, the character and destiny, of the child, and of the future man or woman. How can that child, as it comes to man’s or woman’s estate, possibly be in harmony with God or man? Elements of strife were incorporated, by its father’s agency, into its body and soul, as its birthright inheritance.

It is vain to talk to her about cheerfully and joyfully submitting to her condition, and, for her child’s sake, to give it a loving, joyous welcome. She cannot, by an effort of will, nor by any course of discipline, nor from considerations of duty, compel her nature to acquiesce in such a wrong to herself and her child, and willingly and joyfully accept a maternity thrust upon her in contempt of her dearest and most sacred rights, and in opposition to her heart’s appeals for mercy. She finds no call in her nature for a child; she cannot create it by an effort of will. She is not yet prepared, mentally or physically, to meet the sufferings and responsibilities of such a relation. She can no more force herself into giving a loving reception to that unwelcome child, and to that undesired maternity, than she can force herself into a true love and respect for the father of such a child, and the doer of this wrong.

Just so far as she was accessory to its conception, and a willing partner in the relation in which it originated, she is responsible, and worthy of condemnation; but she is not to blame for not joyfully accepting a maternity thrust upon her without her consent. As well blame a woman for not loving and respecting a husband thrust upon her by parental, ecclesiastical, or civil authority, and from whom, by the instincts of her nature, she is strongly repelled. As well blame the flower for shrinking from the mildew that blights it, or the dove for shrinking from the vulture that would rend it.

War is declared between that mother and her child before it is born; a war that must be lasting as life,—a deadly conflict, to which the happiness, and, it may be, the life of the child must be victimized. No efforts of the mother of your child, after it is born, can make peace between her and her child, and obliterate from its mind all traces of the wrong done to it before it was born. And this internal, organic discord, this war, must extend to you, the father, as well as to the mother. The mother cannot feel toward your child, thus originated, as she would had her soul rejoiced in its conception, its development and birth, with a pure, concentrated joy, which such a maternity alone can bring. After the child of an undesired maternity is born, pity for the helpless babe, rather than a rapturous welcome to a longed-for treasure, prompts her to care for it,—though facts demonstrate that a deadly hate in the mother’s heart can pursue the offspring of such a maternity after it is born. Yet before it is born, but one feeling fills her soul,—a feeling of deep, settled hostility against its existence,—a feeling that it has no right to be. Its existence is unsanctioned and unconsecrated by its mother. The child struggles into life against the spirit of murder in her heart. Talk of a mother’s joy over such a birth! It is blasphemy against Maternity.

Pause, my friend, and let your thoughts dwell on this subject. You would exalt and perfect human nature. You live but to people this earth with nobler types of men and women. It is the only true and great end of life. If you would labor for this sublime object, pause and consider this crime, in its bearing on the mother towards your child, and through her, on the character and destiny of that child. Enter into and comprehend, if you can, the feelings which an undesired maternity must excite in the mind of your wife towards your child. Measure, if you can, the wrong done your child by giving it being under such circumstances. See its helplessness, its innocence, and the crime you perpetrate against it. Can that child love and respect you? Can it ever forgive you? Can it ever be reconciled to you? In vain you talk to such a child about filial gratitude and obedience. It will answer by pointing you to paternal wrong, inflicted on its helplessness. Disobedience, ingratitude and defiance are constitutional,—bred in its bones, organized into every fibre of its being.

Consider well the power your wife holds over your child, and over its destiny as a man or woman, and ask—Shall that power be for good or evil? Shall it be exerted to give your child a beautiful, healthy, vigorous body, or a body corrupted and deformed by a painful and loathsome disease? Shall it be used to secure to your child’s soul tenderness, truth, justice, generosity and nobleness, or wrath, revenge, meanness and falsehood?—to impress on its moral nature the stamp of Divinity, or the stamp of a thief, a slaveholder, a pirate, a murderer, or an assassin?

It is for you, the husband and father, to answer these questions. Mainly, if not entirely, you are to decide whether this great power shall be a blessing or a curse to your child. How? Never impose on your wife a maternity, except at the call of her own nature. When she is ready to take charge of the germ of a new life, and can joyfully welcome the responsibilities and trials of its development and birth, then, and never till then, impart it to her. Then will a tenderness ineffable, a love that is all-hoping, all-enduring and all-pervading, and a joy unspeakable and full of glory, preside, like a wise and loving Providence, over the conception, ante-natal growth and education, and the birth of your child. A heart, tender, loving and vigilant as the heart of God, will watch over it for good. The perfection and happiness of your child will be the one controlling motive of her life, and whether she eat or drink, labor or rest, or whatever she does, she will do all to the glory of that priceless and most welcome charge you have committed to her care.

How ennobling, how imposing is Maternity, when thus bestowed and thus accepted! How sublime its responsibilities, how pure its joys! How heroic its sufferings, how august its martyrdom, when thus joyfully and calmly endured! There is no heroism of earth so imposing, so sublime, and so full of glory, as that of Maternity, when joyfully accepted, and lovingly and calmly endured! No human act can be so potent and so lasting in its results. But no agony is so appalling as that of a Maternity from which the soul of woman shrinks with disgust and horror.

The character of individual and social man, and the destiny of the race, are wrapped up in Maternity. Shall a function so replete with suffering and responsibility be imposed on woman, against her prayers and her tears, merely for the momentary gratification of man? Manhood as well as womanhood, cries out against the outrage. All that is true and noble in man says, “Forbear!” Only that which is sensual, brutal, devilish, can perpetrate this wrong against the mother and child, or approve of it.

Woman would find rest and fulness of joy in man. She rushes to him as to her tower of strength, to shelter and be sheltered to love and be loved, to bless and be blessed. A love that knows no fear, a trust that fears no danger, lay her in his bosom, and prompt to and consecrate the entire surrender of her soul and body to his manly keeping. Will you call that man true, noble or honorable, who can take advantage of a love so pure and a trust so boundless, to impose on her a suffering and anguish, and a responsibility, for which she is not prepared, and from which her soul shrinks; thus placing her in an unnatural position in regard to her child, and thus outraging his own offspring, by giving it an existence loathed even by the mother who give it birth? What shall be said of the man who will commit a deed so atrocious? A husband he is not; he ignores the first principles of a true and noble manhood. He is but a selfish, disgusting sensualist. A father he is not, deserving tender and loving reverence from his wife, but an ANIMAL, whose brutal gratification is the first law of life, and one whom neither mother nor child can respect.

But I will reserve further remarks on this subject until my next letter.