The articles in your paper headed “Is suicide a crime?” have suggested to my mind to ask another question “Is Foeticide a crime?” Not that I personally have any serious doubts about the unlawfulness of such an act; but the custom prevails to such an extent in the United States that there are comparatively only few persons who can see any wrong in it. Medicines for this purpose are openly advertised and sold; in “respectable families” the ceremony is regularly performed every year, and the family physician who should presume to refuse to undertake the job, would be peremptorily dismissed, to be replaced by a more accommodating one.
I have conversed with physicians, who have no more conscientious scruples to produce an abortion, than to administer a physic; on the other hand there are certain tracts from orthodox channels published against this practice; but they are mostly so overdrawn in describing the “fearful consequences,” as to lose their power over the ordinary reader by virtue of their absurdity.
It must be confessed that there are certain circumstances under which it might appear that it would be the best thing as well for the child that is to be born as for the community at large, that its coming should be prevented. For instance, in a case where the mother earnestly desires the destruction of the child, her desire will probably influence the formation of the character of the child and render him in his days of maturity a murderer, a jail-bird, or a being for whom it would have been better “if be never had been born.”
But if foeticide is justifiable, would it then not be still better to kill the child after it is born, as then there would be no danger to the mother; if it is justifiable to kill children before or after they are born then the next question arises: “At what age and under what circumstances is murder justifiable?”
As the above is a question of vast importance for thousands of people, I should be thankful to see it treated from the theosophical standpoint.
An “M. D.” F. T. S.
George Town, )
Colorado, U. S. A.