THE NEW REPUBLIC
mutual limitation, mutual annulment and mutual exasperation. Home with an atmosphere of contention is worse than none for the child, and it is the interest of the child, and that alone, that will be the test of all these things. I do not think that the arrangement in couples is universally applicable, or that celibacy (tempered by sterile vice) should be its only alternative. Nor can I see why the union of two childless people should have an indissoluble permanence or prohibit an ampler grouping. The question is greatly complicated by the economic disadvantage of women which makes wifehood the chief feminine profession, while only for an incidental sort of man is marriage a source of income; and further by the fact that most women have a period of maximum attractiveness after which it would be grossly unfair to cast them aside. From the point of view we are discussing, the efficient mother who can make the best of her children is the most important sort of person in the state. She is a primary necessity to the coming civilisation. Can the wife in any sort of polygamic arrangement, or a woman of no assured status, attain to the maternal possibilities of the ideal monogamic wife? One is disposed to answer, No. But then, on the other hand, does the ordinary monogamic wife do that? We are dealing with the finer people of the future, strongly individualised people, who will be much freer from stereotyped moral suggestions and much less inclined to be dealt with wholesale than the people of to-day.
I have already shown cause in these "Anticipations" to expect a period of disorder and hypocrisy
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