What most women need above all are heart interests rather than intellectual occupations. That was why occupation with war activities did so much good. That is the reason, too, that club life and reading and other similar pursuits often fail to be helpful to women in their ills to the extent that might possibly be expected. Above all, women need interests in children and the ailing, and these can be supplied by visits to hospitals or by taking an active interest in nurseries, though this is often not personal enough in its appeal to catch a woman's deepest attention. One of the great reasons why there are more nervous diseases among women in our time than in the past is because children are fewer, and because so many women are without children and the calls that they inevitably make on their mothers. Unfortunately, the traditions of the present day are to a great extent in opposition to that family life with a number of children, which means not only the deepest interests for woman but also such inevitable occupations in the care of them that she has very little time to think about herself. It may seem quixotic, that is, {278} demanding unnecessary magnanimity to suggest that these modern ideas should be discarded by those who wish to assure themselves such interests in middle life as will prove definitely preventive of many neurotic conditions, but it is manifestly the physician's duty to make such suggestions. Life has really become full of dreads for many women in this regard. A gradual reduction in the birth rate which has deprived so many women of the heart interests that were particularly valuable at and after middle life; has been the source of a great deal more suffering without any satisfaction, than would be associated in any way with the care of children. It is extremely unfortunate, then, that this phase of social evolution should have taken place, for the quest of ease and pleasure has proved a prolific source of feminine ills. It is well recognized now that the reason for this reduction in the birth rate is not physical but ethical. It is a matter of choice and not necessity. There is a conscious limitation of the number of children in the family accomplished deliberately, and as a rule the women consider that they are justified in the procedure because they thus conserve their own health and provide such {279} few children as they have with healthier bodies than would otherwise have been the case.