1) it is not probable within our lifetime
that everybody will be guaranteed an income adequate to the needs
of a family of, say, three children--'needs' as viewed by educated
parents. The most sympathetic administration would have its hands
full for many a year coping with the problem of helping those
thousands of our people who have been just on or very near the
bread-line. Those worst off hitherto need help first. A man earning
between three and four hundred a year should not claim Government
help to breed children, when there are such numbers of people
living on a much lower wage. But it must be perfectly clear to each
member of the Commission who figures the matter out that a salary
of less than L400 will not enable more than two children to be
given such chance of development as every parent reasonably
desires. It is pertinent to ask here what is the average number of
children in the families of the British middle class--which is
mainly the stratum from which our legislators, rulers, and
magistrates have been drawn. Do such people breed freely?
Self-respecting parents prefer to do without such Government help
as family allowances; but knowing the cost of training a child they
claim the rights first, to decide how many children they will
breed, and, secondly, to live themselves normally satisfied married
lives. Few women, moreover, of average intelligence are to-day
content to be breeding-machines, and their husbands support them in
that attitude. With regard to domestic help, even were this, or
nursing schools, or both, provided by the State, the responsibility
for her children's well-being would be still all-absorbing, at
least during the first four years of each one's growth. Students of
child psychology are insistent that the pre-school period is the
most important in the life of the individual and requires the most
skilful attention. Natural affection is not enough; it must be
wedded to care for the child's mind. Now, willy-nilly, modern life
itself takes such toll of nervous energy that there are few
educated women today who go through all the child-bearing period
and have sufficient nerve force to welcome each child that may
'come along' and rear it happily. Yet without adequate nervous
energy in the mother what family can develop into healthy and
well-balanced useful