What a Young Wife Ought to KnowDrake, Emma F. Angell (Emma Frances Angell)
Science
What a Young Wife Ought to Know
Drake, Emma F. Angell (Emma Frances Angell)
Infants -- Care; Marriage; Women -- Health and hygiene
“The destruction of the end or purpose of an institution
is virtually the destruction of the institution itself. I
firmly believe that the greatest sin against God and the
greatest crime against society in the nineteenth century, is
the covert attack, which in one form or another, excused by
one consideration or another, is being waged against God’s
institution of marriage.”—REV. BREVARD D. SINCLAIR.
Do our young women consider and really understand the giant evil which
walks our streets sometimes covertly, sometimes so openly, that with
eyes of discernment it can be easily detected? This terrible evil that
has been so excused, so palliated that it stands out in the minds of
many, dressed, not in its hideous garb of sin and shame, but tricked
in taking dress and attractive coloring—so attractive that many of our
matrons have pointed it out and introduced it to our fresh, beautiful
daughters, and introduced them into its mysteries, and all the horrible
sin this evil is heir to.
I speak of the shamefully prevalent evil of antenatal infanticide.
I quote again from Mr. Sinclair. “A sin of such delicacy that people
affect to be shocked when it is alluded to, and yet a sin which is
practiced, applauded and commended so widely in private, that even the
children are not ignorant of its prevalence among their elders. Indeed
a sin, in which in many cases, daughters are deliberately nurtured and
trained, so that when opportunity is presented for its practice the
conscience is so stultified and suborned by long training and familiarity
with its hellish and poisonous consequences, that it is committed without
compunction.”
O mothers! with us rests in large measure the righting of this terrible
wrong. Are we aware ourselves of its loathsomeness, and are we prepared
to pronounce against it everywhere where our voices can be heard? Shall
we teach our daughters that the institution of marriage is for home and
children, and that unless they are prepared to make the home and desire
children, they are committing a grievous sin to enter its sacred portals?
Every reputable physician grows sick at heart many times, when he is
approached by these untaught and unscrupulous young and older women, to
ask him to be a party with them in the crime of murder, and possible
suicide. “The sin is none the less heinous, and the crime none the less
wicked when it is performed by those who affect ‘the best society,’ or
who with unworthy hands take the bread and wine at the communion table of
a dying Lord, who pronounced His blessing on the pure in heart.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account