Children by chance or by choice, and some correlated considerations

Front matter

AND SOME CORRELATED CONSIDERATIONS

BY

WILLIAM HAWLEY SMITH

Foreword

It is utterly useless to attempt to blink the fact that as times change and the world progresses, conditions change and new policies are imperative. I doubt if the enlightened makers of our Constitution expected or intended that it could be a perfect document, suited to cover all possible contingencies for all future time. At any rate, they left an avenue for amendment open, and we avail ourselves of it from time to time.

But in the earlier day of the world, when the inspired writer imputed Onan's race-suicidal attempts to him for criminality and made his sudden death appear as a punishment from the Lord for his crime, it is doubtful if the sacred writer's inspiration took cognizance of present-day conditions.

It is hardly safe to assert that the same divine Over-ruler who said, "Be fruitful and multiply," when the world was young and population sparse, would use identical phraseology now when applied to sections crowded with the physically and mentally deficient, with struggling, suffering women and underfed, joyless men.

We have come to believe that God means to be good to His creatures and that most of their suf-

1^ Foreword

ferings and shortcomings depend on their shortsighted ignorance of His law or their imperfect interpretation of it, not on the inexorable demands of a jealous Creator.

If war, pestilence, and famine cease, and altruism prevails, we do not need to refer to Malthus for information as to conditions which inevitably result. We surely know that with unrestricted production of offspring there would be a struggle, for a time, for the fit to find means to provide for the unfit ; but that, in the end, without intelligent restrictive measures, the two together would populate the earth beyond the possibility of sustenance for either. We have already seen this in China. We have seen it in India. We have seen it in the slums of great cities. On the other hand, we have the unique experiments of New Zealand and Holland, where, as fewer are bom more are reared. We also have our own anomaly of wealthy and educated families (families in name only) with one child or none, and opposed to this the ignorant toiler and his wife, struggling with their handicap of ignorance and their burden of half a score or more of children. This may be a family, but it is hardly marriage. The former condition (except where physical disabilities prevent child-bearing) might better be called prostitution than marriage ; the latter might better be called slavery.

Control there has been, is, and will be. What shall

Foreword 13

it be, legal or illegal, sane or insane, humane or barbarous ?

The writer of these introductory lines has, for a quarter of a century, spent all the time and thought that he could spare from the family breadwinning (since he has six children of his own) in devising ways and means of encouraging or compelling the childless to have families, the ove^-burdened to curtail, the unmarried to marry, and the married to live naturally, healthfully, and happily.

Never has he seen a book which so simply and sensibly puts before the American public the unanswerable arguments for proper regulation in the size of families.

We need clear expositions on this subject today, when iniquitous laws, conceived, to be sure, in good faith by self-appointed guardians of the public conscience, cause all good people shame and the ignorant or credulous disease, misery and death; when long instructed tradition, bom of ignorance, is so strong that sane efforts to change laws which most enlightened nations have already changed, meet with open hostility or surreptitious side-tracking in the halls of Congress ; and still the carnage goes on, though the war is over.

Intelligent men and women whose families number from two to five children find it almost impossible to live on incomes ranging from two to four thousand a year, while less intelligent workingmen and wo-

1^ Foreword

men, with families several times as large are, many of them, obliged to live on half that income. Young men and women refrain from marriage because, though income has known limits, they know no way of limiting the size of the family. Others, with definite knowledge, marry and have no family, while others, already married and with half a score of children, continue, in their ignorance, to add yet another child annually.

Ignorance and prejudice and old-time dogma have had their day with this question, and reason and common sense are being applied to it.

The author of this book is no novice. "The Evolution of Dodd" made him famous, and "All the Children of All the People" was a great addition to our pedagogical literature and had been so recognized by the teachers of many states; but he has excelled himself in the present volume, wherein he so humanly, irrefutably, appealingly, shows the truths which some social workers and scientists have grasped, but which the people generally have heeded little as questions of gravest public import, though multitudes of individuals have defied law and scorned tradition in attempting to find rational solutions of these problems for themselves.

This is not such an absolutely unknown field as the author states in his introduction ; but it is true that among the people generally little is known. Great is our disgrace and responsibility that we.

Foreword 15

as a medical profession, know things which we know are for the people's good, and yet do not rise up as one man and demand legal right to teach these truths. Great also is the responsibility of legislatures and people to know that these things are known if they do not immediately enact or demand the enactment of the proper legislation. So, since we already know what to do, since we have adequate remedies for this disease of civilization if we could only apply them, this book must serve a wonderful purpose and be of inestimable value in correcting the erroneous thinking of the "neo-Platonic ascetics" whom we still have, and whose "opinions" are still "intermingled with the dogmas of the early Christian theology," and in awakening people to a sense of their responsibility toward their fellow-creatures, even if their own knowledge, probably surreptitiously obtained, is adequate for their own needs.

I believe that this book in itself is capable of awakening a strong enough public opinion to demand and obtain immediate legislation which would so correct our laws as to annually save thousands of lives and countless unspeakable miseries.

I would therefore characterize its author, who advocates "love and service" in his writings and exemplifies them in his life, as a great apostle of this doctrine. Surely he is an altruist par excellence, since his ideas for racial betterment are so sane that sensible people cannot fail to at once adopt them.

Contents

CHAPTER PAGE

Introduction : . . 19

I Chance, Choice, and Progress 27

Introduction

In undertaking a study of what is set forth on the title page of this book, namely: "Children by Chance or by Choice, and Some Correlated Subjects," I am aware that I am venturing into a region that comes as near to being the absolutely unknown as anything that still remains unexplored, in all the world.

There is not a single phase of all the issues involved in these matters that is as yet settled with scientific certainty.

Whether the substitution of choice for chance, in bringing children into the world, is a possibility, even for certain individual parents, is as yet a mooted question, when it comes to the experiences of married men and women, take them as they go!

Much less is it known whether, even if such were discovered, such a definite possibility could ever be made available for all classes and conditions of the human race.

And, even if such a manner of re-populating the earth should be found out, the question still remains whether such conditions would subserve the highest and best interests of humanity as a whole.

j

In a word, the possibility, the practicability, the

utility, the wisdom, of such a condition of affairs

in human life — all these are unsettled issues as

things now are. So much is certain.

But it is equally certain that the unknown and the unexplored always present legitimate fields for attempted discovery, and there is always a poignant fascination that lures men on to try to find out what no one as yet is certain of !

Millions of money have been spent, and many human lives have been sacrificed in attempts to discover the North Pole. My belief is that the truths I am seeking to discover, in my present search, are of far more moment to humanity than is being able to locate the exact spot on the earth's surface where the north end of its axis sticks out into cold weather !

It is in this spirit, and imbued with this belief, that I have been studying the subjects I have discussed in this book for more than forty years.

In the prosecution of such work, I have been assisted by scores, not to say hundreds, of good men and women, married and unmarried, who have most generously given me the benefit of their own personal experiences along the lines of my search. The first noted of these, namely, the married, have let me know what they have found out regarding the first part of my inquiry, namely, that of bringing children into time and space by choice rather than by chance.

Introduction 21

On the other hand, a large number of unmarried men and women have freely submitted to me their own experiences on "some correlated subjects" which are almost, if not quite, as important as the testimony I have heretofore referred to.

Added to the testimony of these two classes of witnesses, I have that of a large number of doctors, lawyers and clergj^men, representatives of three professional classes whose work brings them into close touch with those who know most of these vital affairs of life through their own experiences, and which knowledge these have imparted as patients, clients, or parishioners to their physicians, counselors or pastors, respectively.

To all of these I am under more obligation than I can possibly express, not on my part only, but for the sake of the men and women who, I hope, may profit from what these devoted souls have so faithfully and truthfully transmitted to me, and through me to you who may read these pages.

It goes without saying, that in the very nature of things, the personality of these individuals must remain undisclosed; but none the less, they are all worthy of crowns of honor for what they have so generously donated to this supreme cause in human existence.

What I have done is, to put together these many experiences, and by strictly inductive methods of treatment to try to form some conclusions that shall be of lasting value to those who come after — that is, to generations now living and to those yet unborn.

I have treated some of the things that are involved in these subjects by analogical methods, but in all such cases I have used the utmost care to keep such analogies strictly within the bounds in which they may be made to truthfully apply.

We all know that, as a rule, analogy is one of the most dangerous methods of applied reasoning. I need not stop here to tell why this is so. The world is full of illustrations of this fact, however.

But I am certain none of my readers can find cause for accusing me of any unfairness or injustice in this respect. On the other hand, they will give me credit for calling attention to an untold number of the most grave and flagrant violations of true analogical reasonings, on the part of many writers who have used this method of arriving at conclusions regarding the subjects which I have discussed in these pages.

I wish the reader would make special note of this point, and discern how it works out as this book is read.

In order to give the subjects I have treated a strong foundation to rest upon, I have been obliged to go a good way down, or back, into certain basic principles that pertain to human life and human progress. All such treatment naturally comes in the first part of the book, and for it I bespeak the

Introdiiction 23

most careful attention and thoughtful study on the part of the reader. It is only by fully mastering this part of my argument that one can come into a state of mind for passing just judgment upon the conclusions I have finally arrived at, and which will be found in the later chapters of what I have written.

I have discussed the issues I have presented from two viewpoints: first, that of common humanity; second, that of common sense. Truly, these two are virtually one, in any final analysis. That they have not always been so is the pity! It is my purpose to make them agree, herewith, though I have separated them somewhat by putting one before the other in what I have written.

So now let us begin at the beginning and reason together, calmly, honestly, scientifically, generously, and in a truly unbiased manner on these subjects which all must acknowledge are the most important in the whole realm of human life and action, and especially so just at this particular period of human history, as the denouement of my argument will show.

Chapter I Chance, Choice, And Progress

In the pursuance of these studies, I wish, first of all, to take up and consider the relative values of chance and choice, as their influences for producing results appear among the causes of human progress in general. It is in this way that I shall lead up to and raise the question which I hope to answer before we get through, namely, how these factors relatively apply to the matter of bringing children into this world!

On the first of these points it almost goes without saying, for it is practically self-evident, that the measure of human progress, all along the line — all the way from the primordial conditions of mankind to the highest achievements of the race in the most modem times — is the degree to which man has eliminated chance as a factor in his life and conditionings, and established choice, to the extent of positive certainty of actual results deliberately planned for, and produced by wilfully controlled causes — in its stead !

This is a fundamental principle which is without exception as far as human progress has so far come, as any student of the records of the growth and development of the race can verify if he will take the time to do so.

Just to emphasize the working out of this principle of choice taking the place of chance in human progress, it is only necessary to point out the fact that with primitive man, chance was the chief factor in his life. His food supply was almost wholly dependent upon it, and shelter and clothing were similarly conditioned. If he went out to hunt, he took his chances of finding game, and he fished by the same rule. If he were a shepherd, he led his flock where pasture chanced to be. The first human habitation was a hole in the rocks which its occupant chanced upon, and the scant clothing he and his wore was of chance origin and adaptation. These are the records of individual man in his earliest estate.

Collectively considered, the same chance factors are so pronounced in the early conditionings of the race that their recital seems superfluous. When a plague broke out among a people or tribe, its members had no protection against its ravages, but each had to take his chances of perishing from its unre-

Chance, Choice, and Progress 29

stricted attacks. Famine ran riot after a chance unfavorable season, and there was no way of warding off its devastations. The sailor on the high seas took his chances of surviving the storms he was ill prepared to weather, and the farmer knew not when he sowed his seed what the harvest would be.

But as man has progressed in the scale of being, all these conditions have changed, to a greater or less degree, and the measure of his advance is the total of his emancipation from the chances which so long held him in thrall.

Probably the highest achievements of this principle are found in the realm of animate life-forms below man. Doubtless the variations in plants and animals have always been caused by intelligently directed energy, but none of this was primarily under the control of man; and hence, so far as humanity was concerned, such changes were matters of chance. But as time has gone on man has entered this field of purposeful direction of the life-force, and his guiding hand is now seen in thousands of definite and predetermined forms of vegetable and animal life into whose present status the element of chance enters not a whit. To such degree is this true that it can safely be asserted that the propagation of plants and the breeding of domestic animals at the hands of human guidance is no longer a matter of chance, but one of almost definite scientific certainty. Here not only have the hopes of discoverers been realized.

but the utmost dreams of wild enthusiasts have been surpassed.

It is these achievements which lead us to believe that the elimination of chance as a factor in human affairs will progress with the years till it shall practically disappear altogether ! This, in spite of the fact that there are some fields in which it still reigns supreme, even at this late day, and the obstacles which are arrayed against its extermination seem almost insurmountable.

Among these yet-to-be^attained accomplishments still to be hoped for is that of bringing children into this world by choice rather than by chance, even if now one hardly dares ask the question : Will chance ever he cast out from the highest function of human beings, or must souls forever be incarnated at haphazard?

The processes of evolution are so slow, in their tireless workings, that their watchers and noters sometimes grow heartsick ; but, from what they have already accomplished, we are warranted in prophesying what they will yet effect. And since man has become a factor in helping to forward evolutionary processes, in so many of the ways in which the life-force manifests itself, it is not too much to maintain that, nature and man workvng together and in harmony, conditions will some day be established which will make it certain that every soul born into

Chance, Choice, and Progress 31

this world shall enter hy the gate of definite purpose and assurance rather than at the portal of chance.

It must he possible that, some time, in all the human family, the art of love will be discovered, taught, and acquired, and the science of procreation studied and mastered.

And because these things are so, study and investigation as to the laws that pertain to the generation, the growth and the betterment of all forms of life, from the lowest to the highest, human life included, are strictly in order; and to disseminate a knowledge of such helpful discoveries as may be found, to teach those who come after so that wisdom shall take the place of folly, and "I know" shall supplant "I guess" or "may-be-so" in all the realms of life activity — this is the highest service that any soul can render to the human race. Here lies the labor for the original researcher, the explorer, the philosopher, the thinker, and the workers-for-good, in every line of life.

But here, in especial, lie the purpose and the labor which animate and give pertinence to the studies and observations set forth in the following pages, which are devoted to a consideration of the rightful propagation of the human species, to the bringing of human bodies and souls into time and space, and to the issues that are naturally and inseparably connected therewith.

Whether these things shall forever continue to be as they have for the most part, always been, or whether something better can take their place, this is what all that follows in this book is about.

Chapter II Some Bits Of History

For the sake of deepening and solidifying the foundation principle of progress by choice rather than by chance, it will be well to review, somewhat in detail, some of the results that have already been achieved in the affairs of this world by the use of this method.

A very simple illustration is the fact that the most luscious apple that now gratifies the human palate has been evolved from the bitter fruit of the crabtree, which will draw one's mouth to a pucker; and this change, this progress, has been brought about by the deliberate choice of man to make something better than the primary form of the apple family.

Or, go further back in the expressions of form and force that appear in this world, and note what the choice of man has effected in these realms.* See what chemical exploitations have come to under such guidance! Volumes could not obtain the records of the advancements and improvements which have been made on original appearances and primary conditions on this score.

Or, take the line of mechanical appliances, and contrast what now is with what once was, and see how true it is that all advance in this part of the utilization of energy has come as a result of the choice of man! More volumes could be written in substantiation of this proposition, and but half the truth would then be told.

Or, look at all the variations and developments that have been made in animal life through the exercise of this power of choice, and which power exists in man alone! Compare the hog of to-day with the wild boar of yesterday, or the horses of this generation with those that primarily roamed the plains in uncounted herds, and all of crude feature and form!

Not to make too long a story of this, or to weary the reader with multitudes of examples, let any one think of any expression of electrical or chemical energy, or of mechanical power, or of life-force, which has been made subject to the influence of the choice of man^ and note the changes that have been brought about by such means, and he will see the point I am now driving at.

And when this is done, look at the human race, and think how little has been accomplished for its improvement, at the hands of choice rather than of chance, so far as the reproduction of the species is concerned, and then see!

Some Bits of History 35

On this count, so far in the world's history, hardly a single move for progress has as yet been made! The marvel of it!

On all other planes except that of the improvement of the human race, the choice of man has got in its work; but here it has not, as yet, been given even a reasonable opportunity to express itself. On the contrary, its exercise in this field is, to this day, forbidden by law; and even so grave and reverend a body of men as a committee of leading physicians in one of the foremost Medical Societies in this country, to whom the matter of giving choice rather than chance a place in the economy of human reproduction was referred, made a report which read: "We must uphold the laws of nature against man's meddling 1"

Everywhere else man has "meddled," if you will, with nature's way of doing things ; but here, according to this kind of philosophy, he must forever stand back and let nature have her way, regardless !

In the presence of the Bits of History narrated in this chapter, and of thousands of similars that might be cited, it seems incredible that a body of sane and educated men could be guilty of making a report so utterly at variance with the principles embodied in all human progress. But more of this later.

For the present, let the reader permit this remarkable condition of affairs to get a good grip on his reason, his common sense and his conscience, as a most excellent preparation for looking into th^ following chapters!

Chapter III

As a next step m this study of children coming Into this world by choice rather than by chance, I call the attention of the reader to a most common error which has, so far, been made by nearly all writers and talkers on this subject.

I have shown that choice is an universal factor in human progress, wherever progress has been made, and I have further suggested, by implication, at least, that, by the same token, it should become an item in the matter of the reproduction of the human species, as it is not yet.

Next, I emphasize, strongly, the fact that choice as to what one shall do or shall not do is a disti/nctively huma/n characteristic! No stone, no tree, no mere animal — no form of life or force, below man, has, in and of itself, a power of choice which originates in the individual itself, and which can be exercised solely on the initiative of the individual possessing this quality.

All these lower forms of being, or of state, if they act at all, do so under the control of some power other than anything which originates from within themselves. They are all acted upon by some power outside themselves, and their acts are all determined for them, rather than originated by them. They do what they must and not what they choose to do !

This is a distinctive difference between man and all other created forms, animate or inanimate, whatsoever; and it is this difference that I insist on to the utmost, just at this point in my argument.

Now it is because of this distinctive difference between human beings and all other created forms, this power of choice, of mdividual initiative^ on the part of man, that mankind is thereby set outside of, or apart from and beyond all comparisons with other beings which have not this quality, in all matters where an exercise of will has the possibility of taking the place of a compulsory force acting from without, as the basic cause of the acts which are done by the organisms through which one or the other of these forces acts!

That is, an individuality that has the power within itself of determining its own actions is not to be guided, or ruled, or judged by the laws and precedents that pertain to individualities whose acts are controlled by something outside of, or some one other than themselves !

This is the first great reason why nearly all analogies that are drawn between man and anything be-

"Go to the Ant" 39

low him, are almost entirely worthless, and, in most cases, absolutely false.

Now, in spite of all these plain and undeniable facts, one of the most common methods of trying to teach and direct human beings in their varied wa^^s of life, is to make comparisons with, and to draw analogies from life-forms below mankind, and to apply these, sometimes almost without discrimination or reservation, to the totality of men, women and children, individually and collectively, in all their thoughts, words and deeds!

Thus, Solomon wrote "Go to the ant, thou sluggard," and Jesus said, "Consider the lilies, how they grow." In much the same way Maeterlinck worked out a system of human government from studying hives of bees, and Mendel evolved a theory of the laws of heredity by breeding pigeons; while other men and women have made similar demonstrations in similar ways.

Now all these sayings and conclusions are perfectly right in their way, the only trouble with them being the length to which they are carried by overzealous souls who analogically apply them to humanity! Thus the Wise man was perfectly justified in advising a lazy person to observe and profit by the industrious ways of the ant ; and Jesus gave the best of advice to people who were vain of their dress when he said, "Consider the lilies." Likewise

Maeterlinck did a most wonderful piece of patient observation when he studied the ways of bees as he did; and Mendel is to be commended for his patient and persistent methods of breeding fowls and four-footed beasts.

But the point that should be noted with regard to the conclusions and philosophies that are drawn from a study of any and all forms of hfe below man, and which are afterward made to apply to humanity as a whole, at the hands of analogy is, that they fall down and fail utterly, because of one fatal lack which they all possess, as follows:

Comparisons that are really of value can be made only between things that are alike at the points at wUch the comparisons are made; and to push such comparisons, or analogies, on, to points where the thmgs compared difer essentially—this is to make a grave mistake and to distort methods which might ■work out valuably if only they were not forced beyond tlieir legitimate fields of application!

And here is the place where all these comparisons between man and lower forms of life, and the conclusions drawn from them, fall short! All these obsei-vations and experiments are made upon forms of life below man; and then they are made to apply to matters and things in the human economy which are totally different from the life-experiences from which they are drawn!