56 AMAND ROUTE, M.D., F.R.C.P., ON MOTHERHOOD. 



without having her maternal instincts obscured by sex problems, 

 and when marriage comes, she will be sufficiently prepared for 

 its obhgations and for maternity. 



If sexual problems, which are intensified by the physical and 

 mental developments of adolescence, have not been wisely 

 explained, the growing girl may drift into an ignorance which 

 may lead to disaster, or to a dislike of maternity which may 

 prevent marriage ; or to a mistaken determination to convert 

 normal marriage into a union unassociated with maternity. 



One of the purposes for which we are brought into the world is 

 that when the opportunity for marriage and parenthood should 

 arrive, we should be ready and fit to grasp it, prepared by 

 suitable domestic, hygienic and biological education, and fitted 

 by physical health and moral attainments to bring up our children 

 so that their usefulness in the world may be guaranteed. 



The Ethics of Motherhood and Marriage. 



Motherhood must be normally associated with marriage if 

 it is to be a state of happiness between the partners, and if it 

 is to become a national asset of permanent value. 



As regards young and healthy men and women, marriage can 

 only be a normal, useful and happy union when associated with 

 motherhood. Motherhood without marriage, and marriage of 

 the young associated with the prevention of motherhood, are 

 really mere sexual unions which are not only irregular but are 

 ethically, socially and morally wrong. 



The marriage with which motherhood should be associated 

 must be monogamous, and it must be a permanent union during 

 the joint life of the partners, a union, that is to say, which, as the 

 idea], only the death of one of the partners should be able 

 to shorten " Till Death us do part." 



I would advise everyone interested in the subject to read 

 Dr. F. W. Foerster's book on Marriage and the Sex Prohlemr 

 which Rev. C. H. Maiden, one of the Secretaries of the White 

 Cross League, lent me. Its clear views have helped me greatly 

 to prepare this address. 



* Marriage and the Sex Problem, by Dr. F. W. Foerster, Professor of 

 Education in the University of Vienna, and formerly Special Lecturer on 

 Psychology and Ethics at the University of Zurich; Translated by 

 Meyrick Booth, B.Sc. Messrs. Wells Gardner, Darton & Co., 3, Paternoster 

 Buildings, E.G. 



