Ch. iii. in Russia. 313 



quence of it, will much more than counterbalance 

 any encouragement to marriage from the prospect 

 held out to parents of disposing of the children 

 which they cannot support. 



Considering the extraordinary mortality which 

 occurs in these institutions, and the habits of 

 licentiousness which they have an evident ten- 

 dency to create, it may perhaps be truly said, 

 that, if a person wished to check population, and 

 were not solicitous about the means, he could not 

 propose a more effectual measure, than the esta- 

 blishment of a sufficient number of foundling hos- 

 pitals, unlimited as to their reception of children. 

 And with regard to the moral feelings of a nation, 

 it is difficult to conceive that they must not be sen- 

 sibly impaired by encouraging mothers to desert 

 their offspring, and endeavouring to teach them 

 that their love for their new-born infants is a pre- 

 judice which it is the interest of their country to 

 eradicate. An occasional child-murder from false 

 shame, is saved at a very high price, if it can only 

 be done by the sacrifice of some of the best and 

 most useful feelings of the human heart in a great 

 part of the nation. 



On the supposition that foundling hospitals at- 

 tained their proposed end, the state of slavery in 

 Russia would perhaps render them more justifi- 

 able in that country than in any other ; because 

 every child brought up at the foundling hospitals 

 becomes a free citizen, and in this capacity is 

 likely to be more useful to the state than if it had 

 merely increased the number of slaves belonging 



