It is the aim and end of a thing which is of sole importance; in this case the aim and end being the happiness and welfare of the child. And that is the point which I want to harp upon, the necessity of keeping the goal in view and of not wandering off into side issues. It was for the sake of the end, namely, obtaining happiness, that I tried to show in my articles upon marriage how common sense might secure this desired state. And it was to _the end_ of what might be best for England that I pleaded for the necessity of using fair judgment over the question of facilitating or restricting divorce. And it is now to _the end_ of helping the coming race to be fine and true that I want to talk about the responsibility of motherhood. Let us take the subject from the very beginning. PRE-NATAL INFLUENCES The thought for the child should commence with the first knowledge of its coming birth. A tremendous control of self, and emotions, and foolish habits, and a stern command of nerves should be the prospective mother's constant effort, as science has proved that all pre-natal influences have such powerful effect upon the child; and, surely, if any woman stopped to think of the colossal responsibility she has undertaken in having become the vehicle to bring a soul from God to earth, she would at least try to employ as much intelligence in the fulfilment of her obligation as she puts into succeeding in any of the worldly pursuits in life. Think of the hours some women spend in painful discipline by going through exercises to keep their figures young and their faces beautiful--the massage! the cures! and the "rests" they take to this end--but who let their waiting time for motherhood be passed in a sort of relaxation of all control--getting into tempers, indulging in nerves, over-smoking, or tiring themselves out with excitement without one thought for the coming little one, except as an inevitable necessity or a shocking nuisance. During this period the wise woman ought to study such matters as heredity. She ought to view the characteristics of her own and her husband's families, and then firmly determine to counteract the objectionable features in them by making her own mind dwell upon only good and fine attributes for her child. She ought to try to keep herself in perfect health by using common sense, and, above all, she should _determine_ to fight and conquer the nervous emotions which more or less beset all women at such time. She ought to encourage happy and loving relations with her husband, and try in every way to be in herself good and gentle and brave. It is the most important moment in the whole of a woman's life for self-discipline, because of the prodigious results of all her moods and actions upon the child, and yet, as I said before, it is one of the commonest sights to see a woman who at other times is a very good sort of creature, simply letting herself go and becoming an insupportable bore to her husband and the whole house, with her