236 STATE BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



Think of the mothers of Michigan going out to whip, even a fiend (if 

 there is such a thing), to death! The brutal murder was terrible, but is 

 not the remedy proposed much worse? Could two wrongs make one 

 right? 



Friends! let us look the matter squarely in the face. There are ter- 

 rible wrongs in this world, and fearful ignorance and brutality. It is no 

 sentiment that is needed, but work. 



It is hardly necessary to tell farmers' wives that the way to accom- 

 plish anything is "to work," but there is another side to their lives which 

 sometimes is not fully appreciated; they have so much time to think. 

 The reason so many of our best men have come from the farm and 

 ■country life is because they had time to think. 



These Institutes and these women's meetings are grand, and it is 

 ■because you will have time and quiet to "ponder these things in your 

 hearts," that the best help the world will receive in the great fight with 

 brutality and ignorance will come from the ideal mothers in our country 

 homes. 



A PHYSICIAN'S COUNSEL. 



DR. MARIA W. NORRIS, GRAND RAPIDS. 



I wish I might impress upon yon ladies today the importance of abso- 

 lute confidence between a mother and her child, not only as to the joy and 

 blessedness it gives personally, but as to the future results upon coming 

 generations. I wish I could go into the details of character building 

 from a scientific standpoint, showing yon how the tiny, delicate, ingoing 

 nerve cells make their impression upon brain cells, and how the out 

 carrying nerves report by thought and action just what the message 

 has been, good or bad, I wish I might tell you how, when proper stimu 

 lus is fiashed. the brain cells receive high, holy and lofty impressions 

 that give by out carrying nerves external evidences of virtuous character. 



I wish you might understand that the physical basis of a vicious life is 

 but the stimulation of such nerve cells that waken a host of accustomed 

 activities, such as vile memories, evil thoughts, depraved appetites, hav- 

 ing well worn routes through or by the out carrying nerves that quickly 

 respond in deeds of like character. Every voluntary action, good or bad, 

 beats a path for its fellow action to follow, until nerve cells become 

 "specialized," until they cannot transmit an impression except in certain 

 directions; hence the importance of starting right impulses over these 

 nerves, of keeping the track clear, so to speak, for right action, until good 

 habits are formed instead of bad — nerves specialized for the right, 

 instead of the wrong, way of thought and action. 



I believe it the part of wisdom to teach little children the pure truths 

 of science in regard to the beginnings of life; the wonderful m^'sterv and 

 miracle of birth, which grows to me more and more wonderful as I rev- 

 erently watch its process. 



There are two books that I am glad to mention here today and also to 

 recommend as being very helpful in teaching the truths of sexual life to 

 young people- "Reproduction," by Edmund A. Cook, and "Plain Talks," 



