The second contention of birth controllers is that a high birth-rate, by increasing poverty, causes a high death-rate. In the first place, there is no doubt that poverty, necessary features of which are mal-nutrition or insufficient food and bad housing, is directly associated with a high death-rate, although this view was once shown by theLancetto need important qualifications.
"With respect to the greater mortality amongst the poor than the rich, we have yet to learn that the only hope of lessening the death-rate lies in diminishing the birth-rate. We have noproofas yet that the majority of the evils at present surrounding the poor are necessarily attendant upon poverty. We have yet to see a poor population living in dry, well-drained, well-ventilated houses, properly supplied with pure water and the means of disposal of refuse. And we have yet to become acquainted with a poor population spending their scant earnings entirely, or in a very large proportion, upon the necessities of life; for such is not the case when half the earnings of a family are thrown away to provide adulterated alcoholic drinks for one member of it. Until reforms such as these and others have been carried out, and the poor are able and willing to conform to known physiological laws, it is premature to speak of taking measures to lessen the birth-rate—a proposal, be it said, which makes the humiliating confession of man's defeat in the battle of life." [25]
It will be seen that the qualifications practically remove the question from dispute. [26] If the conditions of the poor were thus altered, poverty, as it exists to-day, would of course disappear. As things are, we find that a high death-rate is related to poverty, as is proved, for example, by the death-rate from tuberculosis being four times greater in slums than in the best residential quarters of a city.
The correct answer to the birth controllers is that a high birth-rate is not the cause of a high death-rate, because high birth-rates, as shown in the previous chapter, are not the cause of poverty, but vice versa. Moreover, all the statistical evidence goes to prove that in this matter we are right and that Malthusians are wrong.
In China, where there is said to be a birth-rate of over 50 per 1,000, and where over 70 per cent. of infants are helped to die, the high death-rate is due clearly to degraded social customs. In the slums of Great Britain the high death-rate is also due to degraded social conditions. It is not due to the birth-rate. Of this the proof is simple, (a) Among the French Canadians, where the average family numbers about nine, this high birth-rate is not associated with a high death-rate, but with the increase of a thrifty, hard-working race. In Ontario the birth-rate went up from 21.10 in 1910 to 24.7 in 1911, and the death-ratefellfrom 14 to 12.6. (b) Again, in 1911 the corrected birth-rate for Connaught was 45.3 as against a crude rate of 24.7 for England and Wales; and in Connaught, where there is no need for Societies for preventing Parents being Cruel to their Children, the infant mortality rate [27] is very much lower than in England, although the birth-rate is much higher and the poverty much greater. In Bradford, a prosperous English town which pays particular attention to its mothers and children, the infant mortality in 1917 was 132 per 1,000 and the birth-rate 13.2. In Connaught, where there are no maternity centres or other aids to survival, but on the contrary a great dearth of the means of well-being, the infant mortality was only 50, whilst the birth-rate was actually 45! [28] So untrue is it to say that a high death-rate is due to a high birth-rate.
Again, birth controllers claim that a low birthrate leads to a low infant mortality rate. Now, it is really a very extraordinary thing that, whatever be the statement made by a Malthusian on the subject of birth-control, the very opposite is found to be the truth. During the last quarter of last century afallingbirth-rate in England was actually accompanied by arisinginfant mortality rate! During 1918 in Ireland [29] the crude birthrate was 19.9, with an infant mortality rate of 86, whereas in England and Wales [30] the crude birthrate was 17.7 with an infant mortality rate of 97, and in the northern boroughs the appalling rate of 120. In England and Wales the lowest infant mortality rate was found to be in the southern rural districts, where the rate was 63, but in Connaught the rate was 50.5. This means that in England a low birth-rate is associated with a high infant mortality rate, whereas in Ireland a high birth-rate is associated with a low infant mortality rate. [31] These cold figures prove that in this matter at least the poorest Irish peasants are richer than the people of England.
The Malthusian claim that a low birth-rate leads to a low death-rate is also disproved by the vital statistics of France.
"The death-rate of France has not declined at the same rate as the birth-rate has, and, while the incidence of mortality in France was equal to that of England in the middle of the seventies, the English mortality is now only five-sevenths of the French. England thus maintains a fair natural increase, although the birth-rate has declined at an even faster pace than has been the case in France….
"The French death-rate is higher than is the case with most of her neighbours, and it can quite well be reduced. The reasons for her fairly high mortality are not to be found in climatic conditions, racial characteristics, or other unchangeable elements of nature, nor even in her occupations, since some of the most industrial regions have a low mortality." [32]
I have tabulated certain vital statistics of twenty Departments of France.
The following table, covering two periods of five years in twenty Departments, proves thatthe death-rate was lowerin the ten Departments having the highest birth-rate in France than in the ten Departments having the lowest birth-rate.
THE TEN DEPARTMENTS HAVING THE HIGHEST BIRTH-RATE FRANCE1909-1913 1915-1919Rates per 1,000 population Still- Rates per 1,000births populationDepartments. Living Deaths Natural per 1000 Births deathsbirths increase births
Moselle 27.6 16.5 +11.1 - 14.7 15.4Finistère 27.2 18.1 +9.1 4.0 15.9 18.2Pas-de-Calais 26.8 17.4 +9.4 4.2 - -Morbihan 25.7 17.8 +7.9 4.4 15.0 19.0Côtes-du-Nord 24.5 20.6 +3.9 4.2 14.4 20.0Bas-Rhin. 24.3 16.2 +8.0 - 13.3 16.1Meurthe-et-Moselle 23.2 19.2 +4.0 4.3 - -Lozère 22.6 17.3 +5.2 4.2 12.4 17.5Haut-Rhin. 22.4 16.0 +6.4 - 10.3 15.4Vosges 22.0 18.7 +3.3 4.7 - -
Total Averages 24.6 17.7 +6.8 4.2 13.7 17.3
Côte-d'Or. 15.4 18.2 -2.8 3.1 9.9 20.5Allier. 15.1 15.7 -0.6 3.3 8.4 18.8Gironde 15.1 17.3 -2.2 4.5 10.1 21.2Haute-Garonne. 15.1 20.4 -5.3 4.0 9.0 22.5Lot 15.0 21.0 -6.0 4.5 7.5 20.6Nièvre 14.9 17.4 -2.5 3.2 8.8 20.0Tarn-et-Garonne 14.9 20.1 -5.1 4.7 7.9 20.7Yonne 14.4 19.1 -4.7 3.8 8.9 22.0Lot-et-Garonne 13.7 19.1 -5.4 4.4 7.4 20.1Gers 13.2 19.2 -6.0 4.1 6.8 19.8
Total Averages 14.6 18.7 -4.0 3.9 8.4 20.6
Moreover, the figures show that, prior to 1914, the Departments with the lowest birth-rate were becomingdepopulated. On the other hand, the enormous fall in the birth-rate throughout the country from 1915 to 1919 is a memorial, very noble, to the heroism of France in the Great War, and to her 1,175,000 dead. Certain other facts should also be noted. In France the regulations permit that, when a child has died before registration of the birth, this may be recorded as a still-birth; and for that reason the proportion of still-birthsappearshigher than in most other countries.
Malthusian claims are thus refuted by the vital statistics of France; but it should be clearly understood that these figures donotprove that the reverse of the Malthusian theory is true, namely, that a high birth-rate is the cause of a low death-rate. There is no true correlation between birthrates and death-rates.
As birth controllers rely very much upon statistics, and as figures may very easily mislead the unwary, it is necessary to point out that the Malthusian contention that a high birth-rate is the cause of a high death-rate is not only contrary to reason and to facts, but is also contrary to the very figures which they quote. A high birth-rate is often associated with a high death-rate, but a general or uniform correspondence between birth-rates and death-rates has never been established by modern statistical methods. To these methods brief reference may be made. A coefficient of correlation is a number intended to indicate the degree of similarity between two things, or the extent to which one moves with the other. If this coefficient is unity, or 1, it indicates that the two things are similar in all respects, while if it be zero, or 0, it indicates that there is no resemblance between them. The study of correlation is a first step to the study of causation, because, until we know to what extent two things move together, it is useless to consider whether one causes the movement of the other; but in itself a coefficient of correlation does not necessarily indicate cause or result. Now in this country, between 1838 and 1912 the birth-rate and the death-rate show a correlation of .84; but if that period be split into two, the correlation from 1838 to 1876, when the birth-rate was fluctuating, isminus.12, and in the period after 1876 the correlation isplus.92. This means that the whole of the positive correlation is due to the falling of the death-rate, and that birthrates and death-rates do not of necessity move together. [33]
After a careful examination of the vital statistics for France, KnudStouman concludes as follows:
"In France no clear correlation exists between the birth-rate and the death-rate in the various Departments. The coefficient of correlation between the birth-rate and the general death-rate by Departments (1909-1913) was 0.0692±0.1067, and including Alsace and Lorraine—0.0212±0.1054, indicating no correlation whatsoever. A somewhat different and more interesting table is obtained when the correlation is made with the mortality at each age class:
Under 1 year 0.3647 ± 0.0986 1-19 years 0.4884 ± 0.0816 20-39 years 0.6228 ± 0.0656 40-59 years 0.5028 ± 0.0801 60 years and over 0.2577 ± 0.1001
"A peculiar configuration is observed in these coefficients in that a quite pronounced positive correlation exists at the central age group, but disappears with some regularity towards both extremities of life. If the mortality has any influence upon the natality this cannot be in the form of replacement of lost infants and deceased old people, therefore, as has frequently been suggested. That a high death-rate at the child-bearing age should be conducive to increased fertility is absurd, neither does it seem likely that a large number of children should make the parents more liable to diseases which are prevalent at this period of life. The reasons must, then, be looked for in a common factor.
"Now the only disease of importance representing the same age-curve as do the correlation coefficients is tuberculosis. This disease causes in France 2 per cent. of the deaths under one year, 24 per cent. of the deaths from 1 to 19 years of age, not less than 45 per cent. from 20 to 39, 18 per cent. at ages 40 to 59, and less than 2 per cent. at the ages over 60. Will a high tuberculosis mortality, then, be conducive to great fertility, or do we have to fear that a decrease of the natality will be the result of energetic measures against tuberculosis? Hardly. The death-rate may be reduced, then, without detrimental effects upon the birth-rate.
"What can the factor be which influences both the tuberculosis incidence and the birth-rate? We know that the prevalence of tuberculosis is conditioned principally by poverty and ignorance of hygiene. The Parisian statistics, as compiled by Dr. Bertillon and recently by Professor L. Hersch, show a much higher birth-rate in the poor wards than in the richer districts, and the high birth-rates may be furnished largely by the poorer elements of the population. A comfortable degree of wealth does not imply a low birth-rate, as is abundantly shown elsewhere, and one of the important questions which suggest themselves to the French statistician and sociologist is evidently the following: How can the intellectual and economic standard of the masses be raised without detriment to the natality?
"We believe that the time is opportune for solving this question. The past half-century has been lived under the shadow of defeat and with a sense of limitations, and of impotence against fate. This nightmare is now thrown off, and, the doors to the world being open and development free, the French people will learn that new initiative has its full recompense and that a living and a useful activity can be found for all the sons and daughters they may get. The habit of home-staying is broken by the war, and new and great undertakings are developing in the ruined north-east as well as in the sunny south." [34]
[Footnote 25:The Lancet, 1879, vol. ii, p. 703.]
[Footnote 26: Poverty is a term of wide import admitting many degrees according as the victim is deprived more or less completely of the ordinary necessities in the matters of food, clothing, housing, education, and recreation. As used by Malthusians and spoken of here it means persistent lack of one or more of these necessary requisites for decent living. Vide Parkinson,Primer of Social Science(1918), pp. 225 sqq.]
[Footnote 27: The infant mortality rate is the number of deaths of infants under one year old per 1,000 births in the same year.]
[Footnote 28: See Saleeby,The Factors of Infant Mortality, edited by Cory Bigger.Report on the Physical Welfare of Mothers and Children, vol. iv, Ireland (Carnegie U.K. Trust), 1918.]
[Footnote 29:Fifty-fifth Annual Report of the Registrar-General for Ireland, containing a General Abstract of the Numbers of Marriages, Births, and Deaths, 1918, pp. x, xxix, and 24.]
[Footnote 30:Eighty-first Annual Report of the Registrar-General of Births, Deaths, and Marriages in England and Wales, 1918, pp. xxiv, xxxii, and xxxv.]
[Footnote 31: This is also the emphatic testimony of Sir Arthur Newsholme, in hisReport of Child Mortality, issued in connection with theForty-fifth Annual Report of the Local Government Board(dated 191?), PP. 77-8.]
[Footnote 32: Knud Stouman, "The Repopulation of France,"InternationalJournal of Public Health, vol. ii, no. 4, p. 421.]
[Footnote 33: Dr. Major Greenwood. VideThe Declining Birth-rate, 1916, p. 130.]
[Footnote 34:International Journal of Public Health, vol. ii, no. 4, p. 423.]
The fact that Malthusians are in the habit of citing the birth-rate in certain Catholic countries as a point in favour of their propaganda is only another instance of their maladroit use of figures: because for that argument there is not the slightest justification. The following paragraph from a recent speech [35] in the Anglican Church Congress by Lord Dawson, Physician to the King, is a good example of their methods in controversy:
"Despite the influence and condemnations of the Church, it (artificial birth control) has been practised in France for well over half a century, and in Belgium and other Catholic countries is extending. And if the Roman Catholic Church, with its compact organisation, its power of authority, and its discipline, cannot check this procedure, is it likely that Protestant Churches will be able to do so? For Protestant religions depend for their strength onthe conviction and esteem they establish in the heads and hearts of their people."
I have italicised the closing words because it would be interesting to know, in passing, whether anyone denies that these human influences also contribute to the strength of the Catholic Church. Among recent converts to the Faith in this country are many Protestant clergymen who may be presumed to have known what claims "on their conviction and esteem" their communion had. Moreover, in France, amongst recent converts are some of the great intellects of that country. If it be not "conviction and esteem" in their "heads and hearts," what other motive, I ask, has induced Huysmans, Barrés, and others to make submission to Rome?
Secondly, it is true that for over half a century the birth-rate of France has been falling, and that to some extent this decline is due to the use of contraceptives; but it is also true that during the past fifty years the Government of France has made a determined but unsuccessful effort to overthrow the Catholic Church; and that it is in so far as the Government has weakened Catholic influence and impeded Catholic teaching that the birth-rate has fallen. The belief of a nation will not influence its destiny unless that belief is reflected in the actions of the citizens. Father Herbert Thurston, S.J., [36] thus deals with the argument implied:
"Catholicism which is merely Catholicism in name, and which amounts to no more in the supposed believer than a vague purpose of sending for a priest when he is dying, is not likely to have any restraining effect upon the decline of the birth-rate. Further, it is precisely because a really practical Catholicism lays such restrictions upon freedom in this and in other matters, that members of the educated and comfortable classes, the men especially, are prone to emancipate themselves from all religious control with an anti-clerical rancour hardly known in Protestant lands. Had it not been for these defections from her teaching, the Catholic Church, in most countries of mixed religion, would soon become predominant by the mere force of natural fertility. Even as it is, we believe that a country like France owes such small measure of natural increase as she still retains almost entirely to the religious principle of the faithful few. Where the Catholic Church preserves her sway over the hearts of men the maintenance of a vigorous stock is assured."
In the first place, it is noteworthy that the birth-rate varies with practical Catholicism in France, being much higher in those Departments where the Church is more flourishing. As was shown by Professor Meyrick Booth in 1914, there are certain districts of France where the birth-rate ishigherthan in the usual English country districts. For example, the birth-rate in Finistère was 27.1, in Pas-de-Calais 26.6, and in Morbihan 25.8. On the other hand, in many Departments the birth-rate was lower than the death-rate. This occurred, for example, in Lot, Haute Garonne, Tarn-et-Garonne, Lot-et-Garonne, and in Gers. In the two last-named Departments the birth-rates were 13.6 and 13.0 respectively.
In the following table I have tabulated more recent figures concerning the vital statistics in these two groups of Departments, and rates for the two periods of five years, 1909-1913, and 1915-1919, in each group are compared.
It will be noted that in the three Departments, where practical Catholicism is most flourishing,
1909-1913. 1915-1919.
Departments. Rates per 1000 Still- Deaths Rates per 1000population Births under populationper 1 yearLiving Deaths National 1000 per Births DeathsBirths Increase Births 1000livingbirths
Finistère. 27.2 18.1 +9.1 4.0 116.7 15.9 18.2Pas-de-Calais 26.8 17.4 +9.4 4.2 135.3 — —Morbihan. 25.7 17.8 +7.9 4.4 113.7 15.0 19.0
Total Averages. 26.5 17.7 +8.8 4.2 121.9 15.4 18.6
Lot. 15.0 21.0 -6.0 4.5 148.0 7.5 20.6Haute Garonne. 15.1 20.4 -5.3 4.0 121.3 9.0 22.5Tarn-et-Garonne 14.9 20.1 -5.1 4.7 134.7 7.9 20.7Lot-et-Garonne. 13.7 19.1 -5.4 4.4 112.0 7.4 20.1Gers. 13.2 19.2 -6.0 4.1 102.4 6.8 19.8
Total Averages. 14.3 19.9 -5.5 4.3 123.6 7.7 20.7
there is a high birth-rate, and moreover that in these Departments both the death-rate and the infant mortality rate islowerthan in the five Departments with the lowest birth-rate.
Professor Meyrick Booth's comments are as follows:
"The above five departments (in which the decline of population has been most marked) are adjacent to one another in the fertile valley of the Garonne, one of the wealthiest parts of France; and we may well ask: Why should the birth-rate under such favourable conditions be less than half that which is noted for the bleak district of Finistère? The noted statistician, M. Leroy-Beaulieu, has some interesting observations to offer upon this paradoxical state of things. Considering the country in general, and these districts in particular, he notes that the most prolific parts of France are those in which the people have retained their allegiance to the traditional Church (in the case of the Pas-de-Calais we have a certain degree of adherence to the orthodox faith combined with the presence of a large mining population). M. Leroy-Beaulieu expresses the opinion that the Catholic Church tends, by means of its whole atmosphere, to promote a general increase of population; for, more than other types of Christianity, it condemns egoism, materialism, and inordinate ambition for self or family; and, moreover, it works in the same direction through its uncompromising condemnation of modern Malthusian practices. He draws our attention, further, to the new wave of religious life which has swept over thehaute-bourgeoisieof France during the last few decades; and he does not hesitate to connect this with the fact that this class is now one of the most prolific (perhaps the most prolific) in the nation. Space forbids my taking up this subject in detail, but it appears from a considerable body of figures which have been collected that, while the average number of children born to each marriage in the English Protestant upper middle class is not more than about 2.0 to 2.5, the number born to each marriage in the corresponding class in France is between 3.0 and 4.0. Taking the foregoing facts into consideration, it would appear that Roman Catholicism—even in France—is very considerably more prolific (where the belief of the people is at all deep) than English Protestantism. This applies both to the upper and lower classes." [37]
In all probability Lord Dawson was unaware of the foregoing, but there is one fact which, as a Neo-Malthusian, he ought to have known, because the omission of this fact in his address is a serious matter. When referring to France as a country where birth control had come to stay,Lord Dawson did not tell his audience that the Government of France has now suppressed the only Malthusian periodical in that country, and has proposed a law, whereby those who engage in birth control propaganda shall be imprisoned.
As regards other countries, Holland is usually described as the Mecca of Malthusians, being "the only country where Neo-Malthusianism has been given the opportunity of diminishing the excessive birth-rate on eugenic lines, i.e. in the reduction of the fertility of the poorest classes," [38] and where a "considerable rise in the wages and general prosperity appears to have taken place side by side with an unprecedented increase of population." When we come to investigate this claim we find that, of the eleven provinces of Holland, two are almost entirely Catholic, these being North Brabant, with 649,000 inhabitants, and Limburg, with 358,000 inhabitants. On the other hand, in Friesland, with 366,000 inhabitants, not more than 8 per cent, are Catholics. The vital statistics for 1913 are quoted by Father Thurston, S.J.:
"… We find that in Limburg the crude birth-rate is 33.4, in North Brabant it is 32.5, but in Friesland it is 24.3. Of course, this is not the beginning and end of the matter. In North Brabant the death-rate is 16.36, in Limburg it is 15.28, in Friesland it is only 11.21, but the fact remains that in the two Catholic provinces the natural increase is 16.17 and 18.15, while in the non-Catholic province of Friesland it is 13.15. Further, no one can doubt that in such densely populated districts as North and South Holland and Gelderland the Catholics, who number more than 25 per cent, of the inhabitants, exercise a perceptible influence in raising the birth figures for the whole kingdom. The results would be very different if the entire country adopted Neo-Malthusian principles." [39]
As was proved by the census of religions in 1906, the United States of America is becoming a great stronghold of the Faith. In Massachusetts the Catholic Church numbered 1,100,000 members, whereas the total membership of all the Protestant Churches was 450,000. In Illinois there were about 300,000 Methodists and 1,000,000 Catholics. There were 2,300,000 Catholics in the State of New York, and about 300,000 Methodists, while no other Protestant Church numbered more than 200,000. The New England States, once the home of American Puritanism, are now great centres of Catholicism.
Professor Meyrick Booth [40] explains this remarkable change as being due to two causes: (1) The influx of large numbers of European Catholics, who cling tenaciously to their religion; (2) the greater fertility of these stocks as compared with the native population. Moreover, he has tabulated the following statistics:
State. Population Chief Religious Bodies Births & Birth(1906) Deaths rate per(b. and d.) 1,000
Indiana 2,700,000 Methodist 233,000 b. 36,000 13.0Prot. Episcopalian 102,000 d. 36,500Disciples 118,000R.C. 175,000Iowa. 2,224,000 Methodist 164,000 b. 36,000 16.0Lutheran 117,000 d. 20,000Presbyterian 60,000R.C. 207,000Maryland. 1,295,000 Methodist 137,000 b. 19,000 15.0Prot. Episcopalian 35,000 d. 20,000Baptist & smaller,about 100,000R.C. 167,000California. 2,377,000 R.C. 354,000 b. 32,100 14.0Prot. bodies about d. 32,400(All Churches weak) 250,000Kentucky 2,290,000 Baptist 312,000 b. 35,000 15.0Methodist 156,000 d. 18,000R.C. 166,000
In these States the birth-rate is low; in three there are actually more deaths than births; and in all five the proportion of Catholics is comparatively small. These States may be compared with five others, in which the Catholic and the foreign elements are well represented:
State. Population Chief Religious Birth and Birthrate(1910) Bodies Deaths per 1000
New York. 9,113,000 R.C. 2,280,000 b. 213,000 22.0Jews (?) 1,000,000 d. 147,000Methodist 300,000Presbyterian 200,000
Rhode Island 540,000 R.C. 160,000 b. 13,000 24.0Baptist 20,000 d. 8,000Prot.Episcopalian 15,000
Massachusetts 3,336,000 R.C. 1,080,000 b. 84,000 25.0Congregational 120,000 d. 51,000Baptist 80,000All Protestantstogether 450,000
Michigan 2,800,000 R.C. 490,000 b. 64,000 23.0Methodist 128,000 d. 36,000Lutheran 105,000
Connecticut 1,114,000 R.C. 300,000 b. 27,000 24.0Congregational 66,000 d. 17,000Prot.Episcopalian 37,000
In these States the birth-rate is very much higher than in the former. Furthermore, a New York paper [40] investigated the birth-rate in that city with special reference to religious belief, and concluded that the different bodies could be graded as follows with respect to the number of children per marriage: (1) Jews, (2) Catholics, (3) Protestants (Orthodox), (4) Protestants (Liberal), and (5) Agnostic. Professor Meyrick Booth, who is himself a Protestant, concludes his survey of the evidence as follows:
"looking at the situation as a whole, there is good reason to think that the Protestant Anglo-Saxons are not only losing groundrelatively, but must, at any rate in the East and middle East, be suffering an actual decrease on a large scale. For it has been shown by more than one sociologist (see, for example, the statement inThe Family and the Nation) that no stock can maintain itself with an average of less than about four children per marriage, and from all available data (it has not been found possible to obtain definite figures for most of the Western and Southern States) we must see that the average fertility of each marriage in this section of the American people falls far short of the requisite four children. Judging by all the figures at hand, the modern Anglo-Saxon American, with his high standard of comfort, his intensely individualistic outlook on life, and his intellectual and emancipated but child-refusing wife, is being gradually thrust aside by the upgrowth of new masses of people of simpler tastes and hardier and more natural habits. And, what is of peculiar interest to us, this new population will carry into ascendancy those religious and moral beliefs which have moulded its type of life.
"The victory will be, not to those religious beliefs which most closely correspond to certain requirements of the abstract intellect, but to those which give rise, in practice, to a mode of life that is simple, natural, unselfish, and adequately prolific—in other words, to a mode of life thatworks, that isLebensfähig." [41]
As things are, the original Protestant stock of America is being swamped by the growth of the Catholic, the Jewish, and the Negro population. Moreover, the United States is faced by the grave problem of a rapidly increasing coloured race. Despite this fact the American Malthusians are now demanding that a National Bureau should be established to disseminate information regarding contraceptives throughout their country! And what of the other reformers? They also are very busy. They have already abolished those cheering beverages from grapes and grain, or rather they have made alcohol one of the surreptitious privileges of the rich. They are seeking to enforce the Sabbath as a day of absolute rest, not for the glory of God but in order that tired wage-slaves may have their strength renewed for another week of toil in the factories and the mills. Again, they would uproot from the homely earth that pleasant weed whose leaves have made slaves of millions since the days of Sir Walter Raleigh. All these things would they do. There are some things the reformers have not done, and these things are recounted by an American writer, Dr. Anthony M. Benedik:
"The divorce peril, the race-suicide evil, the greed for ill-gotten gold, things like these the reformers touch not. And these things it is which harm the soul. Abolishing the use of alcoholic drinks and of tobacco, putting the blue laws into effect, suppressing all rough sports, may make a cleaner, more sanitary, more hygienic, a quieter world. And yet there keep recurring to mind those words of the Master of mankind, 'What doth it profit a man if he gain the world and suffer the loss of his soul?' What worthy exchange can a man make for his soul?" [42]
On the other hand, it is good to read that the Governor of New York has recently signed a bill making it a misdemeanour for landlords to refuse to rent apartments to families in which there are children. In that State children thus regain equal rights with dogs, cats, and canaries. Is it too much to ask of the House of Commons that they should pass a similar law? We shall see.
The dangers of birth control were apparent to that great American, TheodoreRoosevelt, when he said:
"The greatest of all curses is the curse of sterility, and the severest of all condemnations should be that visited upon wilful sterility. The first essential in any civilisation is that the man and the woman shall be the father and the mother of healthy children, so that the race shall increase and not decrease." [43]
On a smaller scale the position is the same in England and Wales, where Catholicism has probably checked to some extent the general decline of the birth-rate. In 1919 there were only six towns in England [44] with a birth-rate of over 25 per 1,000, these being St. Helens (25.6), Gateshead (25.9), South Shields (26.9), Sunderland (27.1), Tynemouth (25.9), and Middlesbrough (26.7). Now in these towns the Catholic element is very strong. During the same year in the four registration counties in which these towns are situated, a larger proportion of marriages were celebrated according to the rites of the Church of Rome than in the other counties of England and Wales. [45] The actual proportion of Catholic marriages per 1,000 of all marriages in these four counties was: Lancashire 116, Durham 99, Northumberland 92, and the North Riding of Yorkshire 92. That gives a fair index of the strength of the Catholic population. Again in 1919 we find that Preston, a textile town, has a birth-rate of 17.1, whereas two other textile towns, Bradford and Halifax, have rates of 13.4 and 13.1 respectively: and there can be little doubt that the relative superiority of Preston is mainly owing to her large Catholic population.
The actual birth-rate amongst Catholics in England may be estimated from information contained inThe Catholic Directoryfor 1914. As that work gives the Catholic population and the number of infant baptisms during the previous year in each diocese of Great Britain, and as Catholic children are always baptized soon after birth, it is possible to estimate the birth-rate of the Catholic population. Working on these figures Professor Meyrick Booth [46] has published the following table:
Diocese. Birth-rate per 1,000 of theRoman Catholic population.
Menevia (Wales) 45.2Middlesbrough 38.0Leeds 42.0Liverpool 40.0Newport 53.0Northampton 33.0Plymouth 26.0Shrewsbury 38.0Southwark 39.OWestminster 36.0——Average 38.6——
During the same period the general birth-rate amongst the whole population of England and Wales was about 24 per 1,000. And figures that are even more remarkable have been published by Mr. W.C.D. Whetham and Mrs. Whetham. [47] These writers, having investigated the number of children in the families of the landed gentry, show that the birth-rate amongst the aristocracy has declined.
"A hundred fertile marriages for each decade from 1831 to 1890 have been taken consecutively from those families who have held their title to nobility for at least two preceding generations, thus excluding the more modern commercial middle-class element in the present Peerage, which can be better dealt with elsewhere. We then get the full effect of hereditary stability and a secure position, and do away with any disturbing influence that might occur from a sudden rise to prosperity." [48]
The results were as follows: [Reference: Population]
Year. Number of children to each fertile marriage.
1831-40 7.1 1841-60 6.1 1871-80 4.36 1881-90 3.13
The birth-rate amongst thirty families of the landed gentry, who were known to be definitely Catholic, was also investigated, with the following results:
Years. Number of children to each fertile marriage.
1871-90 6.6
(as compared with 3.74 for the landed families as a whole during the same period.)
The interpretation of these figures is not a matter of faith, but of reason. I submit that the facts areprima facieevidence that by observance of the moral law, as taught by the Catholic Church, even a highly cultured community is enabled to escape those dangers of over-civilisation that lead to diminished fertility and consequently to national decline.
The truth of this statement has been freely acknowledged by many Anglicans. According to Canon Edward Lyttelton: "The discipline of the Roman Communion prohibits the artificial prevention of conception, hence Ireland is the only part of the United Kingdom in which the birth-rate has not declined, and the decline is least in places like Liverpool and those districts where Roman Catholics are most numerous." As we have already seen, there are also other reasons why Catholicism preserves the fertility of a nation.
Without wishing to hurt the feelings of the most sensitive materialist, it is necessary to point out that, apart altogether from the question as to whether the chief or immediate cause of a declining birth-rate is the practice of artificial birth control, or, as seems to be possible, a general lowering of fertility, birth-rates are more dependent on morals and religion than on race and country. During the past century irreligion spread throughout France, and the birth-rate fell from 32.2, during the first decade of the nineteenth century, to 20.6, during the first ten years of the twentieth century. In America, amongst the descendants of the New England Puritans a decay of religion and morals has also been accompanied by a dwindling birth-rate. The decline of the original New England stock in America has been masked to some extent by the high birth-rate amongst the immigrant population; but nevertheless it is apparent in the Census Returns for 1890, when a population of 65,000,000 was expected and only 62,500,000 was returned. Moreover, there is ample evidence in history that, wherever the Christian ideal of a family has been abandoned, a race is neither able to return to the family life of healthy pagan civilisations nor to escape decay. During the past fifty years in England family life has been definitely weakened by increased facilities for divorce amongst the rich, by the discouragement of parental authority amongst the poor, and by the neglect of all religious teaching in the schools. And thus, in the words of Charles Devas, "We have of late years, with perverse ingenuity, been preparing the way for the low birth-rate of irreligion and the high death-rate of civil disorder." [49] The birth-rate in England and Wales reached its highest point, 36.3, in 1876, and has gradually fallen to 18.5 in 1919. During the first two quarters of that year the rate was the lowest yet recorded. During the pre-war year, 1913, the rate was 24.1.
In conclusion, the following statements by a Protestant writer are of interest:
"Judging from a number of figures which cannot be quoted here, owing to considerations of space, it would seem that the English middle-class birth-rate has fallen to the extent ofover 50 per cent. during the last forty years; and we have actual figures showing that the well-to-do artisan birth-rate has declined,in the last thirty years, by 52 per cent.!Seeing that the Protestant Churches draw their members mainly from these very classes, we have not far to seek for an explanation of the empty Sunday Schools…."
"Under these circumstances it is not in the least necessary forProtestant ministers and clergymen to cast about them for evidence ofJesuit machinations wherewith to explain the decline of the ProtestantChurches in this country! Let them rather look at the empty cradles inthe homes of their own congregations!" [50]
The author of the above-quoted paragraphs thus attributes the decline both of the birth-rate and of the Protestant Churches to the general adoption of artificial birth control. With that explanation I disagree, because it puts the horse behind the cart. When the Protestant faith was strong the birth-rate of this country was as high as that of Catholic lands. The Protestant Churches have now been overshadowed by a rebirth of Rationalism, a growth for which they themselves prepared the soil: and diminished fertility is the natural product of a civilisation tending towards materialism. Although the practice of artificial birth control must obviously contribute towards a falling birth-rate, it is neither the only nor the ultimate cause of the decline. The ultimate causes of a falling birth-rate are more complex, and the decline of a community is but the physical expression of a moral change. That is my thesis.
[Footnote 35:Evening Standard, October 12, 1921.]
[Footnote 36: "The Declining Birth-rate" inThe Month, August 1916, p. 157, reprinted by C.T.S. Price 2_d_.]
[Footnote 37: "Religious Belief as affecting the Growth of Population,"The Hibbert Journal, October, 1914, p. 144.]
[Footnote 38: The Secretary of the Malthusian League. VideThe DecliningBirth-rate, 1916, p. 99.]
[Footnote 39:The Month, August 1916, p. 157, C.T.S.: 2_d_.]
[Footnote 40:The Hibbert Journal, October 1914, p. 147.]
[Footnote 41:The Hibbert Journal, October 1914, p. 150.]
[Footnote 42: "Race-suicide and Dr. Bell,"America, October 29, 1921, p. 31.]
[Footnote 43:Daily Chronicle, April 25, 1910.]
[Footnote 44:Eighty-second Annual Report of the Registrar-General ofBirths, Deaths, and Marriages in England and Wales, 1919, p. 89.]
[Footnote 45: Ibid., p. xxvi.]
[Footnote 46:The Hibbert Journal, October 1914, p. 141.]
[Footnote 47:The Family and the Nation, 1909, pp. 139, 142.]
[Footnote 48: Quoted inUniverse, October 22, 1921.]
[Footnote 49: Charles S. Devas,Political Economy, 2nd edition, 1901, p. 193.]
[Footnote 50: Meyrick Booth, B. Sc., Ph.D.,The Hibbert Journal, October 1914, pp. 142 and 152.]
In 1837 Thomas Doubleday [51] maintained that the rising birth-rate of his own time was closely connected with the fall in the standard of living, and his argument implied that, in order to check the excessive birth-rate, it was necessary to improve the condition of the mass of the people. Four years later he publishedThe True Law of Population, wherein he stated that when the existence of a species is endangered—
"A corresponding effort is invariably made by Nature for its preservation and continuance by an increase of fertility, and that this especially takes place whenever such danger arises from a diminution of proper nourishment or food, so that consequently the state of depletion or the deplethoric state is favourable to fertility, and that, on the other hand, the plethoric state, or state of repletion, is unfavourable to fertility in the ratio of the intensity of each state."
By a series of experiments on plants Doubleday discovered that "whatever might be the principle of manure,an overdoseof it invariably induced sterility in the plant." Although his formula is deficient in that food is selected as the one factor in environment which influences fertility, and although it may be an overstatement to claim that fertility varies in exact proportion to abundance or to scarcity, nevertheless his formula contains an important truth which literally knocks the bottom out of the whole Malthusian case.
It is a sad reflection that, while the falsehoods of Malthus have been blindly accepted for the greater part of a century, the work of Doubleday was almost lost in oblivion. His shade has now been recalled to the full centre of the stage, and for this the credit is due to Mr. C.E. Pell. His recent book [52] is a stimulating essay on the declining birth-rate, and contains much evidence that supports the main contention of Doubleday. Although it is impossible to agree with all the deductions made by Mr. Pell, he has nevertheless done a public service by restating the problem of the birth-rate in a new way, by effectively bursting the Malthusian bubble, and by tabulating fresh evidence against the birth-controllers.
Mr. Pell defines the law of births and deaths in two generalisations. The first is: "We have seen that it is a necessary condition of the success of the evolutionary scheme that the variation of the inherited potential degree of fertility between species and species must bear an inverse proportion to their capacity for survival." [53] At first glance this statement appears hard to be understood; but it is obviously true—because it means that a species that is well adapted to its environment can survive with a low degree of fertility, whereas a species that is not well adapted to its environment requires a high degree of fertility in order to survive. Mr. Pell considers that a "capacity for survival" is synonymous with "nervous energy"; but, as our total knowledge of nervous energy is limited to the fact that it is neither matter nor any known force, the change in words does not mark a real advance in knowledge.
The second generalisation is that "the variation of the degree of animal fertility in response to the direct action of the environment shall bear an inverse proportion to the variation of the survival capacity under that environment." [54] Here Mr. Pell and I part company. I have already (Chapter III) disputed the causal connection between birth-rate and death-rate which Mr. Pell here asserts. His generalisation is made by assuming that birth-rates and death-rates rise and fall together: that conditions which produce a high death-rate will also produce a high birth-rate and that conditions which cause a low death-rate will also cause a low birth-rate; that the increase or decline of a population is due to the direct action of the environment; and finally that "theactualdegree of fertility is decided by the direct action of the environment." [55] On that last rock Mr. Pell's barque sinks. The mistake here is analogous to the old Darwinian fallacy, abandoned by Huxley and by Romanes, that natural selection is a creative cause of new species. Even if the hypothesis of evolution—and it is merely a hypothesis—be accepted, the only view warranted by reason is that variation of species and their actual degree of fertility may be produced, not by the direct action of environment, but by thereactionof species to their environment—a very different story.
There is no statistical evidence to prove a uniform correspondence between birth-rates and death-rates, and it is improbable that there should be a physical law of nature whose operations cannot be demonstrated by mathematical proof. Moreover, we know that the same conditions which cause a high birth-rate may cause a low death-rate. In the case of the first settlers in a new country the death-rate is low because the diseases of civilisation are absent and the settlers are usually young, whereas the birth-rate is high. If fifty young married couples settle on the virgin soil of a new country it is probable that for many years an enormous birth-rate, of over 100, will coexist with a low death-rate.
In reality a high birth-rate may coexist with a low death-rate, or with a high death-rate. For example, there is a difference between natural and artificial poverty, the first being brought about by God, or, if any reader prefers to have it so, by Nature, and the second being made by man. Under conditions of natural poverty small groups of people in an open country are surrounded by land not yet cultivated: whereas artificial poverty means a population overcrowded and underfed, living in dark tenements or in back-to-back houses, breathing foul air in ill-ventilated rooms seldom lit by the sun, working long hours in gas-lit workshops for a sweated wage, buying the cheapest food in the dearest market, and drugged by bad liquor. In either case their existence is threatened, although for very different reasons, and the birth-rate rises; but under conditions of natural poverty the death-rate is low, whereas in slums the death-rate is high.
It would appear, then, that under conditions of hardship the birth-rate tends to rise, and that in circumstances of ease the birth-rate tends to fall. If the existence of the inhabitants in a closed country is threatened by scarcity, the birth-rate tends to rise. For example, "In some of the remote parts of the country, Orkney and Shetland, the population remained practically stationary between the years 1801 and 1811, and in the next ten years, still years of great scarcity, it increased 15 per cent." [56]
The governing principle may be expressed in the following generalisation. When the existence of a community is threatened by adversity the birth-rate tends to rise; but when the existence of a community is threatened by prosperity the birth-rate tends to fall. By adversity I mean war, famine, scarcity, poverty, oppression, an untilled soil, and disease: and by prosperity I mean wealth, luxury, idleness, a diet too rich—especially in flesh meat—and over-civilisation, whereby the physical laws of nature are defied. Now the danger of national decline owing to prosperity can be avoided by a nation that observes the moral law, and this is the most probable explanation of the fact that in Ireland, although the general prosperity of the people has rapidly increased since George Wyndham displaced landlordism over a large area by small ownership, the birth-rate has continued to rise. Moreover, the danger to national existence, as we have already indicated (Chapter I, Section. 10) is greater from moral than from physical catastrophes, and when both catastrophes are threatened the ultimate issue depends upon which of the two is the greater. Furthermore, it would appear that moral catastrophes inevitably lead to physical catastrophes. This is best illustrated by the fate of ancient Greece.
The appositeness of this illustration arises from the fact that ancient Greece reached a very high level of material and intellectual civilisation, yet perished owing to moral and physical disasters.
(a)Moral Catastrophe in Ancient Greece
The evidence of the moral catastrophe is to be found in the change that occurred in the Greek character most definitely after the fourth century before Christ. Of this Mr. W.H.S. Jones has given the following account:
"Gradually the Greeks lost their brilliance, which had been as the bright freshness of early youth. This is painfully obvious in their literature, if not in other forms of art. Their initiative vanished; they ceased to create and began to comment. Patriotism, with rare exceptions, became an empty name, for few had the high spirit and energy to translate into action man's duty to the State. Vacillation, indecision, fitful outbursts of unhealthy activity followed by cowardly depression, selfish cruelty, and criminal weakness are characteristic of the public life of Greece from the struggle with Macedonia to the final conquest by the arms of Rome. No one can fail to be struck by the marked difference between the period from Marathon to the Peloponnesian War and the period from Alexander to Mummius. Philosophy also suffered, and became deeply pessimistic even in the hands of its best and noblest exponents. 'Absence of feeling,' 'absence of care'—such were the highest goals of human endeavour.
"How far this change was due to other causes is a complicated question. The population may have suffered from foreign admixture during the troubled times that followed the death of Alexander. There were, however, many reasons against the view that these disturbances produced any appreciable difference of race. The presence of vast numbers of slaves, not members of households, but the gangs of toilers whom the increase of commerce brought into the country, pandered to a foolish pride that looked upon many kinds of honourable labour as being shameful and unbecoming to a free man. The very institution that made Greek civilisation possible encouraged idleness, luxury, and still worse vices. Unnatural vice, which in some States seems to have been positively encouraged, was prevalent among the Greeks to an almost incredible extent. It is hard not to believe that much physical harm was caused thereby; of the loss to moral strength and vigour there is no need to speak. The city-state, again, however favourable to the development of public spirit and a sense of responsibility, was doomed to fail in a struggle against the stronger Powers of Macedon and Rome. The growth of the scientific spirit destroyed the old religion. The more intellectual tried to find principles of conduct in philosophy; the ignorant or half-educated, deprived of the strong moral support that always comes from sharing the convictions of those abler and wiser than oneself, fell back upon degrading superstitions. In either case there was a serious loss of that spirit of self-sacrifice and devotion which a vigorous religious faith alone can bestow. Without such a spirit, as history proves conclusively, no nation or people can survive." [57]
(b)The Physical Catastrophe induced by Selfishness
One of the physical catastrophes that probably most accelerated the fall of Greek civilisation was malarial fever. The parasite of this disease is carried from man to man by Anopheline mosquitoes. These insects, during the stage of egg, larva, and nympha, live in water, and afterwards, as developed insects, in the air. The breeding-grounds, where the eggs are laid, are shallow pools of stagnant water. For that reason the disease is most common in marshy country, and tends to disappear when the land is properly drained. Of this we have an example in England, whence malaria disappeared as the marshes were drained.
In Homer there is a disputed reference to malaria, but it is not possible to ascertain whether the disease was present during the rise of Greek civilisation, and there are no references to this disease in the literature from 700 B.C. to 550 B.C. [58] From this date references to malaria gradually become more frequent, and Hippocrates stated that "those who live in low, moist, hot districts, and drink the stagnant water, of necessity suffer from enlarged spleen. They are stunted and ill-shaped, fleshy and dark, bilious rather than phlegmatic. Their nature is to be cowardly and adverse from hardship; but good discipline can improve their character in this respect." [59] After an exhaustive study of the literature, Mr. Jones concludes "that malaria was endemic throughout the greater part of the Greek world by 400 B.C."
Concerning the causes of a malarial epidemic, Sir Ronald Ross writes: [60] "Suppose that the Anophelines have been present from the first, but that the number of infected immigrants has been few. Then, possibly, some of these people have happened to take up their abode in places where the mosquitoes are rare; others may have recovered quickly; others may not have chanced to possess parasites in suitable stages when they have been bitten. Thus, the probability of their spreading infection would be very small. Or, supposing even that some few new infections have been caused, yet, by our rough calculations in section 12,unless the mosquitoes are sufficiently numerousin the locality, the little epidemic may die out after a while—for instance, during the cool season." The italics are mine, because some writers have suggested that the decline of Greece wasdueto malaria, whereas I submit, as the more logical interpretation of the facts, that a moral catastrophe led to the neglect of agriculture, whereby the area of marshy land became more extensive, mosquitoes more numerous, and the fever more prevalent.
In view of the foregoing facts, the following Malthusian statement, although groundless, is nevertheless an amusing example of the errors that arise from lack of a little knowledge:
"The difficulty of providing for a high birth-rate in a settled community was appreciated by the ancient Greeks, notably by Plato and Aristotle; but their conclusions were swept aside by the warlike spirit of Rome, and the sentimentality of Christianity, so that only a few isolated thinkers showed any appreciation of them." [61]
[Footnote 51: Quoted inThe Law of Births and Deaths, by Charles EdwardPell, 1921, chap. xii.]
[Footnote 52:The Law of Births and Deaths, 1921.]
[Footnote 53: Ibid., p. 40.]
[Footnote 54:The Law of Births and Deaths, 1921, p. 41.]
[Footnote 55: Ibid., p. 40.]
[Footnote 56: Dr. John Brownlee,The Declining Birth-rate, p. 156.]
[Footnote 57:Malaria and Greek History, 1909, pp. 102 et seq.]
[Footnote 58: Ibid., p. 26.]
[Footnote 59: Ibid., p. 85.]
[Footnote 60:Report on the Prevention of Malaria in Mauritius, p. 51.]
[Footnote 61: C.V. Drysdale, O.B.E., D. Sc.,The Malthusian Doctrine and its Modern Aspects, p. 3.]