HEALTH AS A DUTY 



Voluntary refusal to assume parenthood 

 is not in all cases censurable, but in many 

 extremely commendable. Not a few mar- 

 ried people are so diseased in body or mind 

 that they could not have offspring without 

 being guilty of crime. To increase the num- 

 ber of defective human beings or of those 

 whose existence must inevitably be attended 

 by suffering, so far from being praise- 

 worthy, is a base, unsocial, immoral act. 

 Such a parent is guilty of crime against 

 society, which must pity and support his 

 defective progeny, and of crime toward 

 such progeny themselves, fated to pine, 

 languish, suffer and die in consequence of 

 his malfeasance. Herein is turpitude be- 

 side which that of highway robbery, of ar- 

 son, or of murder, turns white. 



On the other hand, parents able and will- 

 ing to produce, educate, mature and send 

 out into society healthy children are public 

 benefactors of foremost rank, compared 

 with whom donors of charity millions be- 

 come insignificant. Dr. Francis Galton, 

 F. R. S., in his Huxley memorial lecture of 



101 



