fact the plan of unrestricted families results in a threefold wrong. It
is nothing less than cruel to women. The overburdened mothers who were
confined once a year or once in eighteen months, never allowed to
regain full strength between confinements, and made prematurely old,
are, I hope, a thing of the past. Marriage on those terms did mean
servitude. Further, the plan is cruel to children. They cannot
on these terms receive sufficient attention. They are not given a fair
start in life, and in many cases do not even receive sufficient healthy
nourishment. These things are of course in part due to the artificial
conditions of modern life. But the conditions are there and cannot be
ignored. And thirdly, the plan involves a wrong to society. We have
great need of healthy well-trained children, but society as a whole
suffers when children are brought into the world who cannot be properly
cared for.

About this point I conceive there really cannot be any doubt whatever.
And thus the problem of birth control forces itself upon our attention.
It is a duty to women, to children, and to the state. The really
difficult question is, "How is it to be achieved?"

One great Church in Christendom replies, "By continence, and by no
other method." And there are many who arrive at the same position
because they hold that sexual intimacy is only justified, and
is only holy, when the deliberate purpose of producing children enters
into it. As I see the matter we come here to the central ethical issue
of this whole matter. Is it true that sexual intimacy is only right and
beautiful when it is entered upon with a creative purpose, or is it
also right and sacramental as an expression of mutual affection?
Or put differently--granting that two persons have allowed their love
to lead to parentage, and have loyally accepted the burdens of family