"A mother bears a child: perfection is complete So far in such a birth. Enabled to repeat The miracle of life,--herself was born so just A type of womankind, that God sees fit to trust Her with the holy task of giving life in turn. . . . . . . . . . How say you, should the hand God trusted with life's torch Kindled to light the word--aware of sparks that scorch, Let fall the same? Forsooth, her flesh a fire-flake stings: The mother drops the child! Among what monstrous things Shall she be classed?" Of course the old Pope is speaking from the Christian point of view when he says that perfection is complete in a birth; he refers to the orthodox belief that the soul of man is created a perfect thing of its kind, a perfect spiritual entity, to be further made or marred by its own acts and thoughts. The mother does not give birth only to a body, but to a soul also, expressly made by God to fit that body. She is allowed to repeat the miracle of creation thus far; as mother she is creator, but only in trust. She has made the vessel of the soul; her most sacred duty is to guard that little body from all harm. A mother who would even let her child fall to escape pain herself would be incomparably more ignoble than the most savage of animals. The rule is that during motherhood even the animal-mother for the time being becomes the ruling power; the male animal then allows her to have her own way in all things.