"You must at least admit that there would be nothing like the usual
poverty if married couples had only one child for every 20s. or so, a
week of wages. Yet the population would continue to increase rapidly,
because very few of the children of small families die or grow up
weakly; and it would become stronger, richer, and of course much
happier." [94]

The false suggestion contained in his first sentence, namely that a high
birth-rate is the cause of poverty, has already been exposed (Chap. II),
and apparently Dr. Binnie Dunlop has never considered _why_ so many of the
English people should be so poor as to enable him to make use of their very
poverty in order to tempt them to adopt an evil method of birth control.
Moreover, his second contention, that a small family produces a higher type
of child, better fed, better trained, and healthier, than is found amongst
the children of large families is contrary to the following facts, as
stated by Professor Meyrick Booth:

"1. A civilisation cannot be maintained with an average of less than
about four children per marriage; a smaller number will lead to actual
extinction.

"2. Much information exists tending to show that heredity strongly
favours the third, fourth, fifth, and subsequent children born to a
given couple, rather than the _first two_, who are peculiarly apt to
inherit some of the commonest physical and mental defects (upon this
important point the records of the University of London Eugenics
Laboratory should be consulted). A population with a low birth-rate
thus naturally tends to degenerate. _It is the normal, and not the
small family, that gives the best children_.