abstinence during the whole of pregnancy is enjoined because it is
believed that the semen would kill the foetus.[12]

The Talmud is unfavorable to coitus during pregnancy, and the
Koran prohibits it during the whole of the period, as well as
during suckling. Among the Hindus, on the other hand, intercourse
is continued up to the last fortnight of pregnancy, and it is
even believed that the injected semen helps to nourish the embryo
(W.D. Sutherland, "Ueber das Alltagsleben und die Volksmedizin
unter den Bauern Britischostindiens," _Münchener Medizinische
Wochenschrift_, Nos. 12 and 13, 1906). The great Indian physician
Susruta, however, was opposed to coitus during pregnancy, and the
Chinese are emphatically on the same side.

As men have emerged from barbarism in the direction of civilization, the
animal instinct of refusal after impregnation has been completely lost in
women, while at the same time both sexes tend to become indifferent to
those ritual restraints which at an earlier period were almost as binding
as instinct. Sexual intercourse thus came to be practiced after
impregnation, much the same as before, as part of ordinary "marital
rights," though sometimes there has remained a faint suspicion, reflected
in the hesitating attitude of the Catholic Church already alluded to, that
such intercourse may be a sinful indulgence. Morality is, however, called
in to fortify this indulgence. If the husband is shut out from marital
intercourse at this time, it is argued, he will seek extra-marital
intercourse, as indeed in some parts of the world it is recognized that he
legitimately may; therefore the interests of the wife, anxious to retain
her husband's fidelity, and the interests of Christian morality, anxious
to uphold the institution of monogamy, combine to permit the continuation
of coitus during pregnancy. The custom has been furthered by the fact