GENETICS AND ETHICS 485 



in so far as it demands greater intellectual and 

 political freedom for women may be a benefit 

 to the race but in so far as it demands freedom 

 from marriage and reproduction it is suicidal. 

 The cry of Rachel, "Give me children or I 

 die," has been turned by many modern women 

 to, "I'd rather die than have children." If 

 the demand for individual freedom blinds men 

 and women to their racial obligations the in- 

 evitable decadence and extinction of their lines 

 must follow. In every age and country where 

 demands for personal freedom have been most 

 insistent and extreme, where men and espe- 

 cially women have demanded freedom from the 

 burdens of bearing and rearing children as 

 well as from other natural social obligations, 

 the end has been degeneration and extinction. 

 This has been the history of many talented 

 races and families of mankind. The decay of 

 the most gifted races of the ancient world, 

 especially those of Greece and Rome, was not 

 due primarily to bad heredity nor to bad ma- 

 terial environment but rather to the growth 

 of luxury and selfishness and unrestricted free- 

 dom; marriage became unfashionable, immo- 



