The importance of mental hygiene calls for no more emphasis on my part; though, did space permit, further illustrations might be given of its scope. It includes the methods in our nurseries, the curriculum of our schools, the care of our adolescents, the increasing differentiation of our industrial processes, the character of our often miscalled recreations. It is concerned with the warding off of nervous breakdowns, and, with Goethe, it would call the attention of all women to the fact that the secret of rest is found not "in quitting a busy career, but rather the fitting of self to one's sphere." It views with anxiety the growing disregard of religious obligations and restraints, and emphasises the grave antenatal responsibilities of parents for their offspring; they who should be the most ardent advocates of a sound heredity, as well as the promoters of a good home environment for their children. XIV. WOMAN'S RESPONSIBILITIES FOR HOME ADMINISTRATION Thus, though the human constitution is still imperfectly understood, though its intricacies and the details of environmental influences are still mainly undefined, the women of every nation must nevertheless see to it that progress in the administration of the home keeps pace with modern demands for revised methods and less conservative practice, in order to give every chance of normal health to their occupants. It is a serious reflection upon many housekeepers that the hall-mark of progressive civilisation, namely growth in power to organise, is generally absent from their domestic methods. The time will come when it will be to them a matter for the deepest searchings of heart that they are directly and inexcusably responsible for a mass of the disharmonies which disfigure the fugue of family life. The fact is too certain to be denied. Homes have not developed in proportion to the opportunities offered, and the chief opponents to progress have been their organisers. The economic link they form between the physical economics of the individual and the social economics of the nation has been unnoticed. Reference to the hygienic significance of due economy of time, of strength and of health, as well as of money, has hitherto been generally met with incredulous smiles; and though home has been extolled as the place for children, how scant has been the attention devoted to their legitimate requirements, and how few demands for special training have emanated from, or been attempted by, those who have undertaken the sole charge of young lives during their most important and impressionable years.