We meet it every day
in the ordinary routine of our lives. The women who are the great
teachers, the great writers, the artists, musicians, physicians, the
leaders of public movements, the great suffragists, reformers, labor
leaders and revolutionaries are those who are not compelled to give
lavishly of their physical and spiritual strength in bearing and
rearing large families. The situation is too familiar for discussion.
Where a woman with a large family is contributing directly to the
progress of her times or the betterment of social conditions, it is
usually because she has sufficient wealth to employ trained nurses,
governesses, and others who perform the duties necessary to child
rearing. She is a rarity and is universally recognized as such.
The women with small families, however, are free to make their choice
of those social pleasures which are the right of every human being and
necessary to each one's full development. They can be and are, each
according to her individual capacity, comrades and companions to their
husbands--a privilege denied to the mother of many children. Theirs is
the opportunity to keep abreast of the times, to make and cultivate a
varied circle of friends, to seek amusements as suits their taste and
means, to know the meaning of real recreation.
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