552 PLAIN FACTS FOR OLD AND YOUNG 



nations, the general object of the crime seems to have 

 been to avoid the trouble of rearing children, or to 

 avoid a surplus, objects not far different from those 

 had in view by persons who practice the same crimes 

 at the present time. 



The destruction of the child after the mother has 

 felt its movements, is termed infanticide; before that 

 time it is commonly known as abortion. It is a mod- 

 ern notion that the child possesses no soul or individ- 

 ual life until the period of quickening,— an error which 

 we have already sufficiently exposed. The ancients, 

 with just as much reason, contended that no distinct 

 life was present until after birth. Hence it was that 

 they could practice without scruple the crime of in- 

 fanticide to prevent too great increase of population. 

 "Plato and Aristotle were advocates of this practice, 

 and these Stoics justified this monstrous practice by 

 alleging that the child only acquired a soul at the 

 moment when it ceased to have uterine life and com- 

 menced to respire. From hence it resulted that, the 

 child not being animated, its destruction was no 

 murder. ' ' 



The prevalence of this crime will be indicated 

 by the following observations from the most reliable 

 sources : 



''We know that in certain countries abortion is 

 practiced in a manner almost public, without speaking 

 of the East, where it has, so to speak, entered into the 

 manners of the country. We see it in America, in 

 a great city like New York, constituting a regular busi- 

 ness, and not jDrevented, where it has enriched more 

 than one midwife." 



''England does not yield to Germany or France in 

 the frequency of the crime of infanticide. ' ' * 



*Jardien. 



