I will next consider Artificial Control. The forces in modern life which
make for birth control are so strong that only convincing reasons will
make people desist from it. It is said to be unnatural and intrinsically
immoral. This word unnatural perplexes me. Civilisation involves the
chaining of natural forces and their conversion to man's will and uses.
Much of medicine and surgery consists of means to overcome nature.
When anaesthetics were first used at childbirth there was an outcry on
the part of many worthy and religious people that their use under such
circumstances was unnatural and wicked, because God meant woman to
suffer the struggles and pains of childbirth. Now we all admit it is
right to control the process of childbirth, and to save the mother as
much pain as possible. It is no more unnatural to control conception by
artificial means than to control childbirth by artificial means. Surely
the whole question turns on whether these artificial means are for the
good or harm of the individual and the community! Do all contraceptive
measures damage the individual? The answer to that depends on the
purpose for which they are used. If they are used to render unions
childless or inadequately fruitful they are harmful. There are grounds
for thinking that unrealisation of maternity favours sterility.
Generally speaking, birth control before the first child is inadvisable.
On the other hand, the justifiable use of birth control is to limit the
number of children, and to spread out their arrival in such a way as to
serve their true interests and those of their home.
That such applications of birth control produce no harm receives support
from the study of the numbers and distribution of the children of the
professional classes.
The advantage and disadvantage of this or that contraceptive is a
technical matter for the doctors to determine.
Again, it has been stated that artificial control is harmful because it
leads to excessive indulgence. Experience and evidence are against this
being a fact.
Contraceptives by the time and circumstance of their application involve
prudence and control. The proper and efficient restraints on undue
sexual indulgence are to be found in mutual consideration, sympathy, and
tenderness and the pressing claims of life's duties.
The sensualist who is not deterred from excess by these considerations
will be completely careless whether his indulgence results in children
or not--he is moved by his selfish impulses alone.