Naturally, but not justly or logically. Between logic and justice the modern man pleads that he is distracted, and he asks time for reconstruction; asks, in other words, that we should leave the trouble to another generation. This shrinking from trouble is of no avail. We have sanctioned the principle of female industry outside the home--millions of women are so employed in England to-day--and we have absolutely no ground to limit it except the natural disability of woman or the social need for her to undertake other functions. Of her natural disability little need be said here. We have had, in most countries, decades of experience of the employment of women in many industries--teaching, nursing, journalism, factory-work, art, theatre, post-office, type-writing, shop-work, and so on. What proportion of complaint to the number of workers is there that their periodical functions make them unfit for employment? We do not need learned experts on gynecology to tell us of the acute and exceptional cases which have come under their observation. The scientific and practical procedure is to make a general inquiry into the net result of our employment of millions of girls and women. Most of us would await such a report with confidence. As long as the wages of women are lower than those of men, we hear very little complaint; nor do we find the work of our schools or the play of our theatres very much interrupted by peculiarly feminine weaknesses. Of late years women have shown that they are equally qualified to be dentists, doctors, chartered accountants, etc. Common-sense would persuade us, if we would find the real limits of woman's capacity, to open to her all the doors of the world of work and learn it by experience. One must give more serious attention to the claim that this economic enfranchisement of women will tend to lessen maternity, and will therefore endanger our social interests. This question of the birth-rate is, in fact, very important from many points of view, and it is extremely advisable to have a clear and reasoned grasp of it. Many people are at once alarmed if it is shown that a practice will tend to lessen the birth-rate. They rarely examine with critical attention the reasons which would be alleged by those who maintain that a lowering of the birth-rate _is_ a social menace.