[72] See Sir Bargrave Deane’s evidence before the Royal Commission on Divorce and Matrimonial Causes, 1912, para. 1163: “My impression is that it is a very serious question—this absence of children—to the married life, and I believe you will find (I am certain it is so from my experience this term) that if there are children it keeps the home together, and they both work together.” Lord Salvesen (Judge of Court of Sessions, Scotland), speaking before the same Commission, and discussing the statistics as to childless and fruitful marriages, said: “I draw this inference, that I think they show where there are children the union is strengthened, and parties are more unwilling to have it dissolved” (para. 6214 of the Report). [73] In addition to the engrossing character of the rôle of mother, and the tendency it has to invade every controlling centre in a positive woman’s nature, we should also remember that, inasmuch as man is only important to woman as a means to an end, his importance must diminish _pro rata_ as the end tends to be achieved and visibly materialized in the form of the growing family. [74] The modern man’s chief safeguard against becoming a complete nonentity in the home is, of course, his hold on the purse-strings. This procures him a sort of perfunctory regard. [75] See footnote, pp. 179, 180. [76] Buffon in his _Discours sur la nature des Animaux_ makes the following profound remark which English people as a whole would do well to take to heart: “_Amour, pourquoi fais-tu l’état heureux de tous les êtres, et le malheur de l’homme? C’est qu’il n’y a que le physique de cette passion qui soit bon; c’est que, malgré ce que peuvent dire les gens épris, le moral n’en vaut rien_” (see _Oeuvres Complètes, Tome 3me_, Paris, 1837, pp. 21-22). [77] As a proof of this, behold the aggressive exultation of the ordinary man over every fresh addition to his family. [78] So far from being conscious of the will to the multiplication of life, it frequently happens that women do all that is required in order to achieve fertilization, and yet protest that they do not wish to have children, or that they do not care for children. [79] The ancient Hindus, from whose great wisdom nothing was hidden, not only openly recognized this fact, but made special provision for it. In the _Book of Manu_ there were special periods of absence allowed for husbands, beyond which their wives were no longer forbidden from seeking fertilization elsewhere (see Book IX, verse 76). It should be borne in mind, however, that a very large proportion of the women who committed adultery during the war did so out of vanity rather than out of passion. The preponderance of negative women in England makes the passionate crime a much rarer occurrence than is generally supposed. See explanation of the rôle of vanity in adultery in the second half of this chapter.