26 MORAL CONDITION OF THE CHILD 



far as personal moral equipment is concerned, on 

 a level with others. Nor can it be shown that the 

 case is different in the far smaller percentage 

 of illegitimate children in our own land. 



When we consider the environment of these 

 children and its legitimate moral effects, we will 

 see that there is a real handicap in the race for 

 life. The immoral conditions which produced the 

 illegitimate relations persist after birth and 

 through life. They can not fail to leave their 

 impression. The child grows up deprived of the 

 helpfulness of one or both parents. Even when 

 the relations were not the outcome of unusual de- 

 pravity of one or both parents, the lack of a 

 proper family life is a great deprivation to the 

 moral character of the child. Aside from this 

 consideration we have no ground for affirming 

 that the illegitimate child is more sinful in tend- 

 ency than are other children. 



But we return from this digression on the per- 

 ennial elements of this subject to the primitive 

 discussion which laid the foundation of the tra- 

 ditional doctrine. Coelestius, the disciple of Pe- 

 lagius, is credited with holding that "sin is not 

 born with a man it is subsequently committed 

 by the man: for it is shown to be a fault, not of 

 nature, but of the will." ("Nicene and Post- 

 Nicene Fathers," V, 239.) In condemning this 

 opinion and excommunicating Coelestius, the 

 Church seemed committed to the materialistic 

 view of sin, as something born in the flesh, and to 



