And one reading such letters, and realizing their significance, is
constrained to wonder how long such a situation can exist.
CHAPTER VII
WHEN SHOULD A WOMAN AVOID HAVING CHILDREN?
Are overburdened mothers justified in their appeals for contraceptives
or abortions? What shall we say to women who write such letters as
those published in the preceding chapter? Will anyone, after reading
those letters, dare to say to these women that they should go on
bringing helpless children into the world to share their increasing
misery?
The women who thus cry for aid are the victims of ignorance. Awakening
from that ignorance, they are demanding relief. Had they been
permitted a knowledge of their sex functions, had they had some
guiding principle of motherhood, those who at this late day are asking
for contraceptives would have swept aside all barriers and procured
them long ago. Those who are appealing for abortions would never have
been in such a situation.
To say to these women that they should continue their helpless
breeding of the helpless is stupid brutality. The facts set forth
earlier in this book, and the cries of tortured motherhood which echo
through the letters just referred to, are more than ample evidence
that there are times when it is woman's highest duty to refuse to bear
children.
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