inexorably. There are a multitude of women, and not a few men, with
lives hopelessly damaged by this blindfold freedom. So many poor girls,
so many lads also, do not get a fair chance against the adult world.
Things mend indeed in this respect; as one sign the percentage of
illegitimate births in England has almost halved in fifty years, but it
is clear we have much to revise before this leakage to perdition of
unlucky creatures, for the most part girls no worse on the average, I
honestly believe--until our penalties make them so--than other women,
ceases. If our age of moral responsibility is high enough, then our age
of complete knowledge is too high. But nevertheless, things are better
than they were, and promise still to mend. All round we raise the age,
the average age at marriage rises, just as, I believe, the average age
at misconduct has risen. We may not be approaching a period of
universal morality, but we do seem within sight of a time when people
will know what they are doing.

That, however, is something of a digression. The intelligent inquirer
who has squared his initially materialistic system of morals with the
problems arising out of the necessity of sustaining pride and
preference, is then invited to explore an adjacent thicket of this
tortuous subject. It is, we hold, of supreme importance in our state to
sustain in all our citizens, women as well as men, a sense of personal
independence and responsibility. Particularly is this the case with
mothers. An illiterate mother means a backward child, a downtrodden
mother bears a dishonest man, an unwilling mother may even hate her
children. Slaves and brutes are the sexes where women are slaves. The
line of thought we are following out in these papers necessarily
attaches distinctive importance to the woman as mother. Our system of
morals, therefore, has to make it worth while and honourable to be a
mother; it is particularly undesirable that it should be held to be