It may be asked,—Why confine the discussion to _Maternity_? Why not look at the broad question of _Parentage_, and include the responsibility of the father, as well as of the mother? For the reason, that Maternity holds a far more intimate relation to the organization and character than Paternity. The mother has a more direct control over human destiny than the father. Woman is far more liable than man to suffer deep and enduring wrong in the office of perpetuating the race. Man, as will be shown, is generally the wrong-doer, when wrong exists; to woman belong the suffering and anguish. Woman is the victim; on man rests the responsibility. Woman’s appeal is to man to spare her this suffering and anguish, except when her nature calls, and then will she, for his sake and her own, joyfully meet and bear the cross. It is meet that woman’s appeal should be sustained. I wish to sustain it; and in so doing, while my remarks will bear mainly on Maternity, Paternity will necessarily come under review. Maternity, when a crime, suggests the questions, Who is the criminal? To what extent is he responsible for the consequences? So, in fact, the whole subject of Parentage is open, as involving the conduct and responsibility of both parents. But, before proceeding to consider this wrong and outrage upon woman, and its influence on her, I wish to allude to two facts bearing directly on the subject. 1. _That which forms the body and soul of the child must come to it, previous to birth, through the maternal organism._ Pause, my friend, and contemplate this fact, in its bearing on the birthright tendencies, the character and destiny, of your child. You and your wife wish to have a child. She prepares herself cheerfully and bravely to bear the sufferings and responsibilities of Maternity. The germ, so small when she takes charge of it, in a brief space assumes the form of a human being, and is increased in size and in weight hundreds of thousands of times. How did the substance reach it which constituted its growth? Every particle of matter that reaches it to form its brain, its nerves, its heart, its lungs, its blood, its bones and sinews, was prepared in the maternal organism, and was carried to it through the medium of her blood. Whatever is received into her system, in the shape of food, drink, air, and various gases, and which goes to nourish her brain, heart, nerves, and other organs, and keep them in healthful activity, must go to form the corresponding portions of the child’s body. The material that nourishes the brain of the mother forms, from the beginning, the brain of the child; that which nourishes the lungs and nerves of the mother forms also the lungs and nerves of the child. So of every organ and portion of the body. From whatever the mother takes into her system must come the body and soul of her child. 2. _This substance, as it passes through the maternal system, must receive the impress of her mental and physical conditions._