Let Dr. Gardner speak again :- “Children, the issue of old men, are habitually marked by a serious and sad air spread over their countenances, which … - John Harvey Kellogg

Timely Warning.-But, in spite of chaste surroundings and all other favorable circumstances, if the child is left in ignorance of his danger, he may yet fall a victim to the devices of servants or corrupt playmates, or may himself make a fatal discovery. Hence arises the duty of warning children of the evil before the habit has been formed. This is a duty that parents seldom perform even when they are not unaware of the danger. They in some way convince themselves that their children are pure, at least, even if others are corrupt. It is often the most difficult thing in the world for patents to comprehend the fact that “their” children are not the best children in the world, perfect paragons of purity and innocence. There is an unaccountable and unreasonable delicacy on the part of parents about speaking of sexual subjects to their children. In consequence their young, inquisitive minds are let wholly in ignorance unless, perchance, they gain information from some vile source. Objections are raised against talking to children or young persons about matters in any degree pertaining to the sexual organs or functions. Some of the more important of them are considered in the introduction of this work, and we need not repeat here. The little one should be taught from earliest infancy to abstain from handling the genitals, being made to regard it as a very improper act. When the child becomes old enough to understand and reason, he may be further informed of the evil consequences; then, as he becomes older, the functions of the organs may be explained with sufficient fullness to satisfy his natural craving for knowledge. If this course were pursued, how many might be saved from ruin! It is, of course, necessary that the parents shall themselves be acquainted with the true functions of the organs before they attempt to teach any one else, especially children.

He is an ill husband that "uses his wife as a man treats a harlot", having no other end but pleasure. Concerning which our best rule is, that although in this, as in eating and drinking, there is an appetite to be satisfied, which cannot be done without pleasing that desire, yet since that desire and satisfaction were intended by nature for other ends, they should never be separated from those ends.

It will be urged that these early destructions are not murders. Murder is an awful word. The act itself is a terrible crime. No wonder that its personal application should be studiously avoided ; the human being who would not shrink from such a charge would be unworthy of the name of human-a very brute. Nevertheless, it is necessary to look the plain facts squarely in the face, and shrink not from the decision of an enlightened conscience. We quote the following portions of an extract which we give in full elsewhere ; it is from the same distinguished authority* whom we have frequently quoted:- “There Is, in fact, no moment after conception when it can be said that the child has not life, and the crime of destroying human life is as heinous and as sure before the period of ‘quickening’ has been attained, as afterward. But you still defend your horrible deed by saying: ‘Well, if there be, as you say, this mere animal life, equivalent at the most to simple vitality, there is no mind, no soul destroyed, and therefore, there is no crime committed.’ Just so surely as one would destroy and root out of existence all the fowls in the world by destroying all the eggs in existence, so certain is it that you do by your act destroy the animal man in the egg and the soul which animates it. . . . Murder is always sinful, and murder is the willful destruction of a human being at any period of its existence, from its earliest germinal embryo to its final, simple, animal existence in aged decrepitude and complete mental imbecility.”