AND here I appeal to the reader’s own fair judgment, whether I over-strain the consequence against such wretched creatures as they cannot but be who must, for bread, be so subservient to the men-midwives, and be what the French call, their _âmes damnées_ (souls sold). Can any thing be more probable than that these _good women_ dignified by the men-practitioners, out of their special grace and favor with the title of midwives, will on all occasion consult the “_advantage_” of their kind _patrons_ and “_real friends_”. And how can that advantage be better consulted than by bungling their work so as to make it _appear_ necessary to have a _candid recourse_ to the good Doctor, who recommended and warranted them? can it, in short, be imagined, that they will be less mere machines than Dr. Smellie’s Dolls, or indeed furnish less occasion, than the education under those Dolls, for the _iron_ and _steel instruments_, which are the most part understood to be indispensably necessary where the midwife shall have failed. And as to such midwives as have been formed or recommended by the men-practitioners, their _not_ failing would indeed be the wonder! THUS the name of a midwife may subsist after the reality shall have perished, and the world so often deceived by mere names, may not perhaps discover this annihilation till long after it is effectuated, or till it is too late to repair the damages, which will hardly fail of discovering it to them. Of good midwives there never were too many; but they are now much too few; though still not more rare in proportion than those of the men-midwives, who may be called good, comparatively to so many of them as are dangerously superficial. Discouragement has already greatly hindered the places of the good female-practitioners who are gone off the stage, from being duly supplied. Proper subjects decline taking up a profession, in which they must have to dread the prevalence of so false a prejudice against them, as that which determines the preference of the male-operators. It is easier to destroy, than to create a-new; and perhaps when the need of good midwives shall be at the greatest, the difficulty of finding such, will make the employing of men-practitioners, with all the so just objections to them, even a necessity. Things are not at present perhaps far from that point, and an alarming consideration that would be to all women, if they were but to reflect on the increase of pain and danger to themselves in the hours already too big with both, of their increase, I say, by the most aukward and violent aid of the men, compared to the so much more effectual and gentle methods so natural to the women-assistents.