PRE-NATAL CULTURE; 
BEING 
SUGGESTIONS TO PARENTS 
RELATIVE TO 
SYSTEMATIC METHODS OF MOULDING THE TENDENCIES OF 
OFFSPRING BEFORE BIRTH. 
BY A. E. NEWTON, 
Author of “ The Better Way,” &c. 
‘‘In our birth * ** we have whole rivers of predispositions, good or bad, 
set running in us—as much more powerful to shape our future than all tui- 
tional and regulative influences that come after, as they are earlier in their 
beginning, deeper in their insertion and more constant in their operation.”— 
Rev. Dr. Busiinell. 
■‘To the well-born child all the virtues are natural, and not painfully ac- 
quired.”—R. W. Emerson. 
WASHINGTON, D. C.: 
Published by the Moral Educational Society, 
No. 1 Grant Place. 
1 879 
Rufus H. Darby-, Printer, 432 Ninth street. PRE-MTAL CULTURE; 
BEING 
SUGGESTIONS TO PARENTS 
relative to 
SYSTEMATIC METHODS OF MOULDING THE TENDENCIES OF 
OFFSPRING BEFORE BIRTH. 
BY A. E. NEWTON, 
Author of “ The Better Way,” &c. 
“Iu our birth * * * we have whole rivers of predispositions, good or bad, 
set running: in us—as much more powerful to shape our future than all tui- 
tional and regulative influences that come after, as they are earlier in their 
beginning, deeper in their insertion and more Constantin their operation.”— 
Rev. Dr. Bushnkll. 
“To the well-born child all the virtues are natural, and not painfully ac- 
quired.”—R. W. Emerson. 
WASHINGTON, L>. C. : 
Published by tiie Moral Educational Society, 
No. l Grant Place, 
1379, The following treatise is reprinted from the columns of Tiufi Alpha, a 
monthly publication, issued by the Moral Educational Society of Washing- 
ton, I). C. PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
INTRODUCTORY. 
That a mother may, during the period of gestation, exer- 
cise some influence, by her own voluntary mental and 
physical action, either unwittingly or purposely, (and aside 
from the usual involuntary action of the laws of heredity,) 
in determining the traits and tendencies of her offspring, is 
now a common belief among intelligent people. But 
probably few have any definite understanding of the pro- 
cess by which such results are effected, or conception of the 
extent to which this process may be controlled, by intelli- 
gent purpose and wise direction, for the benefit of our chil- 
dren and the improvement of our race. 
No more important subject can engage the attention of 
parents, and it is believed there is none in which intelligent 
and loving mothers will take a deeper interest when once 
made intelligible to them. 
In the hope of throwing some additional light upon this 
momentous problem, by means of suggestions and consid- 
erations which the author has met with in no other work, 
and which it is believed will be found practically useful to 
those whose high privilege it may be to usher into the 
world the men and women of the future, these pages are 
written. 
In a previously published essay, entitled “ The Better 
Way” * the writer has expressed the seemingly extrava- 
gant conviction, founded on facts, some of which are there 
* Published by Wood & Holbrook, 15 Laight street, New York. 4 
PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
stated, that “it is for the mother, by the use of appropriate 
means, (provided a sufficient organic capacity has been 
germinally contributed by the father, and provided, also, 
the mother’s efforts are properly seconded by the father,) 
to produce a poet, a thinker, an artist, an inventor, a phi- 
lanthropist, or any other type of manhood or woman- 
hood, desirable or undesirable, as she will. ” 
If this, or any near approximation to it, is possible, it is 
surely worth the while of every intending mother, and 
father also, to make an effort to know in what these 
appropriate means consist, and how to apply them success- 
fully. 
Let us then first give attention to some suggestions on 
THE LAW OF EMBRYONIC MOULDING. 
An author, Dr. Brittan, who has given much study to 
the occult problems of human life, in writing of the “ Re- 
lations of Mind to Offspring, ” gives the following very 
reasonable hypothesis as to the law or process of embry- 
onic moulding: 
“ The singular effects produced on the unborn child by 
the sudden mental emotions of the mother are remarka- 
ble examples of a kind of electrotyping on the sensitive 
surfaces of living forms. It is doubtless true that the 
mind’s action, in such cases, may increase or diminish the 
molecular deposits in the several portions of the system. 
The precise place which each separate particle assumes in 
the new organic structure may he determined by the influ- 
ence of thought or feeling. If, for example, there exists 
in the mother any unusual tendency of the vital forces to 
the brain at the critical period, there will he a similar 
cerebral development and activity in the offspring.”* 
* “Man and his Relations,” by Dr. S. B. Brittan, page 131. 5 
PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
In illustration and confirmation of this law, the same 
author gives the following facts : 
“ A lady, who, during the period of gestation, was 
chiefly employed in reading the poets and in giving form 
to her day-dreams of the ideal world, at the same time 
gave to her child (in phrenological parlance) large Ideal- 
ity and a highly imaginative turn of mind. 
“ Some time since we met with a youth who had finely 
moulded limbs and a symmetrical form throughout. His 
mother has a large, lean, attenuated frame, that does not 
offer so much as a single suggestion of the beautiful. 
The boy is doubtless indebted for his fine form to the pres- 
ence of a beautiful French lithograph in his mother’s 
sleeping apartment, and which presented for her contem- 
plation the faultless form of a naked child. ” 
The electrotyping process referred to in the above quo- 
tation may not be familiar to every reader. It consists in 
causing, by means of electrical agency, the deposit of fine 
particles of metal (as gold, silver or copper) dissolved in a 
powerful acid, upon the surface of any article which it is 
desired should receive a coating of such metal. Gilding, 
silver-plating and copper-facing are now executed to a 
large extent by this curious process, the coating of metal 
thus deposited becoming exceedingly compact and dura- 
ble, and capable of being made of any desirable thickness, 
proportionate to the time occupied in the process. It is 
reasonable to suppose that by a somewhat similar process, 
effected by the vital forces of the mother, and to some 
extent controllable by her mental operations and emo- 
tions, are deposited the molecules of matter which go to 
form the human embryo in all its various parts.* 
* The suggestion in a recent issue of The Alpha, that “mothers’ marks ” 
result from a concentration of nervous force, by the touch of the mother’s 
hand upon some part of her own person while under mental excitement from 
some special cause, appears to accord with and confirm the above stated 
theory. 6 
PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
A striking fact, in further illustration of the same law, 
is given by the author of the valuable book entitled 
“Husband and Wife”* 
It is to this effect: A teacher in a Western State had 
under her instruction five children belonging to one fam- 
ily. “ The two eldest were dull, inert, and slow to learn ; 
while the third, a girl about twelve years of age, was 
remarkably bright, sensitive, and talented. Not only apt 
and quick at her lessons, she possessed a fine poetic tem- 
perament, accompanied by a keen appreciation of the 
beauties of nature; she could also write a theme in prose 
or verse with ease and facility. The children younger 
than this one were both physically and mentally superior 
to the two eldest, but far inferior to her in talent and 
refinement of manners.” These differences were so 
marked that the teacher’s curiosity was excited to learn 
the cause. Becoming intimately acquainted with the 
mother, (who at first could assign no reason for the diver- 
sity,) the teacher at length ascertained the following facts: 
Some months prior to the birth of the favored child, the 
mother (who, though reared in an Eastern State, in the 
enjoyment of fair advantages, had become the wife of a 
farmer in a new country, deprived of literary and social 
privileges, and over-worked in the struggle to acquire a 
competence) had her attention attracted to a volume of 
Walter Scott’s poems, brought to the house by a travel- 
ing peddler; and she was so seized with a desire to pos- 
sess and read the book, that, not having at hand the 
money to purchase it, she had walked four miles at night 
to borrow of a friend a sufficient sum for the purpose. 
“And a glorious time I had in reading it,” she said; “for 
often in the perusal of its pages I forgot my fatigues and 
cares.” Having read the book so often, that she came to 
* Published by Carlton, New York, 1863. PKE-NATAL CULTU11E. 
7 
know much of it by rote, she used to sing the songs to 
the.child when an infant, and afterward to repeat the 
stories to her when a little girl. Here, no doubt, was the 
source of the superior intelligence, refinement and poetic 
tendencies of the child. 
Dr. Elam, in “A Physician's Problems, ”* quotes Sir A. 
Carlisle as saying that “ many years since an old schoolmas- 
ter had told him that, in the course of his personal experi- 
ence, he had observed a remarkable difference in the capaci- 
ties of children for learning, which was connected with the 
education and aptitude of their parents; that the children of 
people accustomed to arithmetic learned figures quicker 
than those of differently educated persons; while the chil- 
dren of classical scholars more easily learned Latin and 
Greek; and that, notwithstanding a few striking excep- 
tions, the natural dullness of children born of uneducated 
parents was proverbial.” 
Every observant teacher could doubtless bear witness 
to the same general facts, and it would be easy to fill a 
volume with testimonies from various sources illustrative 
and confirmatory of the law under discussion. Such facts 
seem to establish beyond question the conviction that the 
mother has it largely in her power, by the use of suitable 
means, to confer on her child (not, indeed, the knowledge 
which she may herself have acquired, but) such a tendency 
of mind and conformation of brain as shall not only facili- 
tate the acquisition of knowledge in any specific direction, 
but make it morally certain that such knowledge will be 
s ought and acquired. 
Hot only this, but they indicate also that any desired 
type of physical beauty may be conferred, even where the 
mother possesses no such quality. 
And if this be true in respect to ordinary intellectual 
* Published by McMillan & Co., London, 1869. 8 
PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
abilities and physical features, it must he equally true in 
regard to extraordinary mental gifts—the qualities of 
genius of every type—and of all moral dispositions and 
spiritual tendencies as well. 
CHANCE VS. INTELLIGENT PURPOSE. 
But it will be noted tliat in tlie cases thus far narrated, 
as in those usually given to the public hearing on this 
topic, the moulding power we are considering appears to 
have been exercised merely by accident or chance; that 
is, without any intelligent purpose on the part of mothers 
to produce the results that have followed. 
Can there be any doubt that the same or similar means, 
if 'purposely and wisely adopted, and applied with the 
greater care and precision which enlightened intention 
would secure, would produce, under the same law, even 
more perfect results ? 
And if it be a fact, as affirmed by Dr. Brittan, that “ any 
unusual tendency of the vital forces to the brain [of the 
mother] at the critical period ” will produce “a similar 
cerebral development and activity in the offspring,” is it 
not altogether probable, also, that an intentional direction 
of the vital or mental forces to any particular portion of 
the brain will cause a development and activity in the cor- 
responding portion of the brain of the offspring ? 
There seems to be no reasonable ground on which these 
propositions can be denied. 
If, then, we accept, as many do, the theory of modern 
phrenology, and regard the brain as made up of a conge- 
ries of organs, which are the instruments of distinct facul- 
ties of the mind or soul, it follows that if the mother 
during gestation maintains a special activity of any one 
organ, or group of organs, in her brain, she thereby 
causes a more full development of the corresponding PRE-NATAL CULTURE, 
9 
organ or group in the brain of the fetus, and thus deter- 
mines a tendency to special activity of the faculties, of 
which such organs are the instruments, in the child. 
And, further, it is plain that if any one organ or fac- 
ulty may he thus cultivated before birth, and its activity 
enhanced for life, so may any other one—and so may 
all. 
It would seem, then, clearly within the bounds of possi- 
bility that a mother, by pursuing a systematic and com- 
prehensive method, may give a well-rounded and harmoni- 
ously developed organism to her child—and this notwith- 
standing even her own defects, which under the unguided 
operation of hereditary law are likely to be repeated in 
offspring. Or it is within her power to impart a leading 
tendency in any specific direction that she may deem desir- 
able for a life of the highest usefulness. 
In this way, it would seem, may ancestral defects and 
undesirable hereditary traits, of whatever nature or how- 
ever strong, he overcome, or in a good degree counter- 
balanced by giving greater activity to counteracting ten- 
dencies ; and in this way, too, it would appear, may the 
coveted gifts of genius be conferred. 
But some may object that the phrenological theory 
relative to the division of the brain into a congeries of sep- 
arate organs is not and cannot be demonstrated. Very 
well. The fact still remains in every one’s consciousness, 
that our minds or souls possess a variety of powers or 
faculties, in some sense distinct; and the evidence still 
holds good that the mother, by the special exercise of any 
one faculty during the critical period referred to, can and 
does create a special tendency to the activity of the same 
faculty in her offspring, which may last throughout its 
earthly life. 
And since it is on the activity, or the lack of it, of the 10 
PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
several faculties and propensities of our nature that the 
characters of individuals depend—their loveliness or defor- 
mity, their morality or immorality, their success or failure in 
life, their happiness or wretchedness here and hereafter— 
and since the welfare and progress of humanity as a whole 
is determined by the characters of individuals—and since, 
again, the tendencies for good or evil inwoven into the 
very woof and texture of the embryo evidently have 
greater power in shaping the characters and acts of indi- 
viduals than all the training and discipline of childhood 
and youth—this matter of culture before birth assumes an 
importance far above that which pertains to any and all 
other departments of education. Hitherto it has been 
least and last in the estimation of mankind generally. 
The time must come when the last shall be first. 
To recapitulate: we seem justified by present physio- 
logical knowledge in stating the law of pre-natal mould- 
ing to he somewhat as follows: The human embryo (the 
structural basis of which is probably contributed by the 
father) is formed and developed in all its parts, even to the 
minutest details, by and through the action of the vital, 
mental and spiritual forces of the mother, which forces 
act in and through the corresponding portions of her own 
organism. And while this process may go forward uncon- 
sciously, or without the mother’s voluntary participation 
or direction, in which case the results are measurably 
uncertain or chance-determined, (or, perhaps, more strictly 
speaking, shaped by influences extraneous to her own will,) 
yet she may consciously and ’purposely so direct her activ- 
ities as with a good degree of certainty to accomplish spe- 
cifically-desired ends in determining the traits and quali- 
ties of her offspring. 
In other words, it would seem to be within the moth- 
er’s power, by the voluntary and intelligent direction of PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
11 
her own forces, in orderly and systematic methods, to both 
mould the physical form to lines of beauty and shape the 
mental, moral and spiritual features of her child to an 
extent to which no limit can be assigned. 
IMPORTANCE OF SYSTEM. 
The methods by which the tendencies of offspring may 
lie shaped before birth are indicated in a general way by 
the facts and observations already set forth, flat that this 
momentous work may be performed with anything like 
completeness, so that not only each department, physical, 
mental and moral, shall receive its due proportion of at- 
tention, and at the proper time, but also that each specific 
faculty of the intellect and of the moral nature shall be 
given the requisite impetus to result in a well-balanced and 
harmonious character, would seem to require the pursuit 
of some well-devised plan or system in the application of 
methods. 
This is probably as important, in pre-natal as in post- 
natal culture. No one thinks of conducting a cony non 
primary school without an order of exercises, and such a 
curriculum of studies as shall, by progressive steps, cover 
the whole ground desired within the allotted time. If 
the course of procedure were left to chance, or to the im- 
pulse of the moment, it is pretty certain that much would 
be overlooked and neglected, and much done out of place 
and therefore to little purpose. So in the process of em- 
bryotic moulding, if it be left merely to the ordinary ac- 
tion of the laws of heredity, with the chance-occurrence of 
modifiying influences, as is usually the case, what else can 
he expected than that parental or ancestral traits, good or 
bad, will strongly preponderate in the child, with now and 
then an erratic variation, desirable or undesirable, and 12 
PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
perhaps a sad deficiency of some faculty or quality impor- 
tant to wholeness. Every wise and loving parent must 
desire to confer on offspring wholeness and soundness in 
every part. 
Besides, if the mother has before her mind a definite 
plan and purpose, to the execution of which she is direct- 
ing and disciplining her energies, she will doubtless be 
thereby measurably guarded and fortified against the often 
disastrous effects of surprises and sudden emotions. 
But it will be apparent to every one that the work of pre- 
natal culture,however intelligently and systematically under- 
taken, cannot effect its best results if the mother’s attention 
to the subject is limited merely to the nine or twelve 
months next preceding birth. Before attempting, then, 
to suggest a plan for orderly and systematic procedure 
during the season of gestation, let us first give some atten- 
tion to the matter of 
ANTECEDENT PREPARATIONS. 
Great as may be the effects produced by judicious man- 
agement during pregnancy, yet these effects must be sub- 
ject to important modifications by previous life-habits, 
long-indulged tendencies, weaknesses, diseases of whatever 
nature, in both parents, and in their ancestors on both 
sides. 
Some persons, indeed, question whether any marked 
improvement can be realized in a single generation. An 
intelligent and valued correspondent of the writer thinks 
him inclined to “ greatly over-rate the direct control which 
parents in any one yeneration may exercise over their off- 
spring, and still more the effect of voluntary mental and 
physical states at the time of conceptionand he adds: 
“Our children are affected by our habitual states, rather PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
13 
than by any transient assumption of habits, or any im- 
pulses or moods which prevail at the given date. The father 
is not what he just then wishes or resolves to be; he is 
what he has been making himself all his life, and what his 
ancestors made him. The cosmic forces require time in 
which to deploy themselves and produce new results, and 
cannot turn about at once in any masculine or feminine 
organ. Their field is the world and the ages.” 
While there is truth in this statement, it is plainly but 
one side of a very complex truth. Numerous facts indi- 
cate that offspring may be affected, and their tendencies 
shaped, by a great variety of influences, and from diverse 
sources, among which moods and impulses more or less 
transient in the parents may be included. 
If it were not so, all children born of the same parents, 
within a few years of each other, should be substantially 
alike in dispositions and abilities. Especially should this 
be the case with all twins, who are doubtless begotten, if 
not at the same moment, at farthest within a few hours 
of each other. But the well-known fact is that children 
nearest of age in the same family often differ markedly 
in their characteristics, and even twins, in some cases, 
exhibit very striking contrarieties of disposition, quality, 
and even of physical feature—indicating, no doubt, a 
marked change of state, from some cause, in one or both 
parents, between the times of their inception, since all 
subsequent affective influences must have been shared 
alike by them. 
The power of vivid sensational and mental impressions 
to directly modify to some extent the action of the cosmic 
forces in embryo-life has been recognized in all ages, at 
least since Jacob’s successful experiment with Laban’s 
flocks. The “ peeled stakes ” set up at the drinking- 
places of the cattle imparted a “ transient impulse,” but a 14 
PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
most effective one for Jacob’s interests. “The Greeks” 
(says a writer in the Popular Science Monthly for. January, 
1879) “ believed so strongly in the potency of pre-natal 
conditions that they not only guarded mothers who were 
bearing with the kindest care, but used even to surround 
them with beautiful works of art, that the imagination 
might act a favorable part.” 
There is, however, no doubt, more or less of uncer- 
tainty attending the action of transient impulses. The 
most, therefore, that we can say with safety is, that our 
children are pretty sure, under the constant forces of 
heredity, to be enstamped by our habitual states, while 
they are also liable to be powerfully affected in their dis- 
positions and tendencies by even the transient assumption 
of habits, or by impulses or moods that may prevail at 
conception or during gestation. 
It is manifestly important, then, to the best results, that 
both our habitual states and our transient impulses should 
be such as will bless and not curse our offspring—impor- 
tant to have all these sources of influence wholly on the 
side of nobleness, virtue, and beauty of character in all 
respects. To this end, does it not behoove every one who 
aspires to the godlike honor of begetting a being in his oi- 
lier own likeness, to first enter in thorough earnest upon 
the work of self-improvement, self-discipline, and moral 
and spiritual purgation ? Is it not incumbent upon all 
such by no means to attempt or consent to become instru- 
mental in initiating a new life until reasonably sure of 
not imparting the taint of moral or physical evils 
to curse its existence ? Can any stronger motive to self- 
improvement be presented to a conscientious mind than 
this consideration affords ? And can any time in life be 
too early to begin this work ?* 
* A lady having much experience as an instructor of youth informs the pre-natal culture. 
15 
All should remember that children have rights, which 
are as sacred as can be those of any other beings; and 
among the first of these is the right to be well-born. 
It hardly need be said, except for the woful thought- 
lessness that often exists on the subject—that so momen- 
tous an undertaking as the originating and nurturing 
of a young immortal—a being that is to enjoy or suffer 
throughout eons of existence, and that is to bless or curse 
its fellows on earth through unknown generations, largely 
according to the characteristics enstamped on it by its pa- 
rents—it hardly need be said that such an undertaking 
should be left in no avoidable degree to chance or acci- 
dent. Above all, it should not be (as it so often is) the 
haphazard result of blind passion, or mere pleasure-seek- 
ing indulgence. Realizing the august responsibilities in- 
volved, both parents should not only act with intelligent 
forethought and deliberate intention, but surely should 
make the best preparation in themselves and their sur- 
roundings of which they are capable. 
Since “ like begets like,” on every plane of existence, 
it is evident that the preparations referred to should in- 
clude every department of the being. We are told that 
the women of ancient Sparta exercised in gymnasiums in 
order to attain the highest bodily vigor, preparatory to 
the exercise of maternity. That practice, or its equiva- 
lent, may well be revived; or, better, women, from child- 
hood, should lie taught to practice such physical exercises 
as will develop and preserve the best bodily health and 
vigor. It should be remembered that ordinary occupa- 
tions, even of the more active kinds, exercise but a part 
of the muscles of the body. The whole should be brought 
into frequent action for the fullest vigor. 
writer that she has found the presentation of this motive a most effective 
means of awakening the interest and arousing the endeavors of girls and 
young women in the direction of both physical and moral culture. 16 
PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
But the physical robustness and power of endurance 
for which the Spartans were noted are by no means all that 
is desirable in our day. A universal culture is now de- 
manded. The mental, affectional, moral, resthetical, and 
spiritual departments of our being require no less develop- 
ment and fullness of expression in us, if we would do our 
noblest work and discharge our full duty to our offspring. 
But the self-culture from which these result is not the 
work of a day, or even a year. In fact, the whole pre- 
vious life is none too long a period in which to prepare 
for so serious an undertaking as the reproduction of one’s 
self. The earlier, therefore, the young of both sexes can 
be intelligently instructed in these matters, and impressed 
with the importance of living for those who may come 
after them, the better may they become fitted for the 
highest responsibilities of life. 
REGENERATION SHOULD PRECEDE GENERATION. 
“ Like begets like,” as a general rule, because, doubt- 
less, in that most wonderful and mysterious process, the 
elaboration of the human germ—one portion (the positive) 
in the male organism, and the other (the negative) in 
the female—by a chemistry too subtle for human analysis, 
the actual elements or essences of every part of one’s 
being, physical, mental and moral, are extracted and com- 
pounded, in infinitessimal yet potential quantities, lo be 
reproduced in the new being created by their union. If 
the taint of physical disease, of mental unsoundness, or of 
moral obliquity, lurks in the system of either parent, it is 
liable (perhaps not always certain) to be infused into the 
germ, and thus to be reproduced after its kind. 
Some persons have imagined that because the impreg- 
nating germ contributed by the male parent is of micro- PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
17 
scopic dimensions, it matters little what his character or 
qualities may he. But this opinion is contrary to all evi- 
dence, and to the analogies of the animal and vegetable 
worlds. The potency of spiritual elements or forces is by 
no means determined by the physical dimensions of their 
vehicle. While the mother may, no doubt,-do much by 
appropriate management toward modifying and counter- 
balancing in manifestation the traits, good or bad, of the 
father, nevertheless the latter evidently furnishes a sort of 
sub-stratum of character which is difficult if not impossi- 
ble of entire eradication. Hence, in human culture, as in 
agriculture, good seed is of no less importance than good 
soil. 
This being so, the importance, on the part of both par- 
ents, of attaining both physical health and mental and 
moral soundness—or of what in religious phraseology has 
been termed “ regeneration and sanctification ”—before 
reproduction is attempted, will be apparent to every one. 
The terms just quoted, no doubt, are often misunderstood 
and their true and full meaning unperceived. Regener- 
ation signifies, literally, generation again, or a second birth. 
In our first birth, which is “ of the flesh,” we come into 
conscious life as individual beings, impelled by selfish an- 
imal instincts, or “ fleshly desires.” The child’s first im- 
pulses, like those of the animal, center in self; it knows 
nothing of, cares nothing for, the welfare of others. This 
is one grade of conscious existence, very well in its 
place, but not the highest of which human beings are ca- 
pable. Unlike the animal, we have the capacity to be- 
come spiritual beings. The germ of a spiritual nature is 
doubtless present in us from the first; but it needs to be 
quickened and developed into conscious activity, as has 
been the germ of the animal. When this takes place, 
earlier or later, under impregnative spiritual influences, 18 
PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
then we experience a second birth—a new life is born 
within us, we enter upon a higher grade of conscious ex- 
istence. One characteristic of this new spiritual con- 
sciousness is regard and care for others, instead of for self, 
or, in other words, universal love. When once the spirit- 
ual selfhood has been born into consciousness, it tends to 
become the ruling power in us, and in proportion as its 
divine promptings are heeded, it will overcome and re- 
move all the evils and impurities of the animal or selfish 
nature. 
“ Sanctification,” means becoming sane, sound, or whole, 
(holy,) and it should he understood in a physical as well 
as a moral and spiritual sense. It is a more or less pro- 
gressive work, consequent upon regeneration, or the awa- 
kening of the spiritual consciousness. Its full result is to 
render us whole, or holy, sound, healthy beings, in body, 
mind and spirit. No one, certainly, can question the de- 
sirableness of this, whatever may he thought of its practi- 
cability. 
It is plain that when once the germinal elements of dis- 
ease and of moral evils shall have been extirpated in pa- 
rents, such elements cannot be transmitted to offspring, 
and the latter will then be spared the painful processes of 
purgation which otherwise are rendered necessary. This 
certainly should be a most potent inducement to every 
intending parent to seek to attain this condition, if attain- 
able. Of its attainability we will speak further on. 
It is the opinion, indeed, of many good, religious peo- 
ple—of those called Shakers, in particular—that when men 
and women have become truly regenerated, they should 
and will have nothing more to do with generation. They 
will then leave that noblest and most godlike of human 
functions to such as are still “ in the flesh,” that is, the 
unregenerate. The common-sense truth, on the contrary,  CULTURE. 
19 
would seem to be that not until people have become re- 
generated, are they at all fit for generation. The off- 
spring of truly regenerate parents may be expected to be 
“regenerate from the womb”—that is, their spiritual na- 
tures may be so quickened before birth, by the activity of 
the spiritual forces in the parents, that, if properly nur- 
tured subsequently, the spiritual in them will assume the 
supremacy from infancy, and maintain it through life. 
Such children will be “ born of the spirit ” at the outset, 
and not merely “ of the flesh.”* 
Let us ask ourselves, what right have we to transmit to 
others—to the dear offspring which every true parental 
heart yearns to bless with every good, and to guard from 
every evil—what right have we to inflict on them the ills 
and weaknesses, the vices and meannesses, which mar and 
deform our own lives? If we allow the desire for a mo- 
mentary gratification to overbear all these considerations, 
and impel us to give origin to a newr life regardless of its 
best interests, what else may we expect than that the be- 
ing tliU3 begotten in our unworthy likeness will, when it 
comes on the stage of action, prove equally indifferent to 
our welfare and that of others ? Such, alas! is the gene- 
eral characteristic of the children of humanity to-day. 
“ A corrupt tree cannot bring forth good fruit.” 
IS IT PRACTICABLE? 
JBut it will be asked by many doubting readers, Is there 
* Were the Shaker communities of this country intelligently to make a prac- 
tical use of the spiritual culture and purification which they claim to have at- 
tained, by reproducing it in offspring born under the favorable material con- 
ditions which their ample wealth enables them to provide, they might intro- 
duce a nobler type of humanity and thus contribute immensely to human 
improvement. Instead of this they waste their powers largely in compara- 
tively futile endeavors to make over such miserably generated specimens as 
chance to fall into their hands, chiefly “conceived in sin and shapen in in- 
iquity,” while their once flourishing societies are said to be dwindling in 
numbers, until in some places they have not enough efficient members left 
even to take care of the property they possess ! 20 
PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
practically any help for the existing state of things? Are 
there reasonable grounds for hoping that parents in gen- 
eral, physically diseased and morally imperfect as they 
are, may by any process of self-culture, or of spiritual 
regeneration, attain to such a state as that they shall not 
transmit physical diseases or moral obliquities to their 
offspring ? Can the sexual appetite, for example, whose 
imperious demands are the chief obstacle to such prepar- 
atory culture as has been herein recommended, be so 
regulated by any means as to admit of this culture? 
We shall be told that all this threadbare talk about 
“ regeneration ” and “ sanctification,” so long heard from 
the pulpits of our popular churches, while very plausible 
in theory, and very desirable in fact, is rarely, if ever, 
realized in practice; and we shall be pointed to numer- 
ous instances of persons professing to have been regen- 
erated and sanctified, in part at least, after the prevalent 
methods, such as Clergymen, deacons, and devout profes- 
sors of religion, whose children give no evidence of in- 
heriting such soundness, either physical or moral, as might 
be looked for under this theory; while not unfrequently 
the children of these classes have proved to he “ twofold 
more the children of hell,” (to use a forcible Scripture 
phrase,) than those whose parents have made no such 
professions. 
The foregoing are pertinent suggestions, and deserve 
candid consideration. 
And, first, as to those cases of seemingly intensified 
depravity in children of professedly religious parents, it 
may be remarked that, were all the facts known regard- 
ing the inception and gestation of such, together with the 
antecedent condition of the parents in all respects, it 
might not be difficult to account for their vicious procliv- 
ities. So vague, superficial, and meager have been the PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
21 
prevalent views, even among the more cultivated re- 
ligious classes, as to what it is to he really regenerated 
and sanctified, and as to how this state maybe attained— 
so little regard has been paid to the finer laws of adapta- 
tion, temperamental and spiritual, between persons en- 
tering the parental relation—so seldom lias the sacred 
right of the mother to choose, in accordance with her 
own highest monitions, the time and the circumstances 
under which she would assume the maternal function 
been delicately respected—so often, indeed, has she 
been compelled, or made to believe it her religious duty 
to accept this function at the husband’s imperious de- 
sire, even against the vehement protest of both soul and 
body on her part, causing an aversion, if not a loathing, 
which quite unfits her for the proper discharge of its 
duties, and produces most unhappy effects upon the tem- 
per and tendencies of her offspring—and so shadowy is 
the ordinary faith of even Christians in any available 
help or guidance from superior sources in these important 
concerns, that the common results among religious peo- 
ple, as among others, furnish little indication of what 
might he, and what will be when greater light and wisdom 
shall have become prevalent relative to these matters. 
It is certainly quite possible that a religious profession 
may often hypocritically cloak a persistent indulgence in 
vicious propensities, wrhich will be pretty sure to crop out 
strongly in offspring. These, in an emphatic sense, are 
the fruits of humanity, and “ by their fruits shall ye know 
them.” Or, indeed, such a profession may honestly con- 
sist with a life-long and earnest (but misdirected and 
therefore unavailing) struggle against inborn propensities, 
which latter, under certain conditions, are at least liable 
to be reproduced in children. Add to these considera- 
tions the further liability that the proclivities of ancestors 22 
PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
more or less remote, on either side, even though they 
may have seemingly leaped over intervening generations, 
may unexpectedly reappear in children without apparent 
cause, (but surely not without actual cause, could it only 
be detected,) and we find abundant explanations of the 
prevalent state of things, without discrediting the idea 
that improvement is practicable. 
HELP IS AT HAND. 
Notwithstanding, then, all the sad experience of com- 
mon life, in suffering the ills entailed upon us by our 
progenitors and in entailing the same upon our offspring, 
there are reasons for the firm conviction that provision 
exists in the constitution of things for the overcoming 
of hereditary evils, so far, at least, that if transmitted at 
all, it shall be in only an ameliorated instead of an intensi- 
fied form; if, in fact, they may not he entirely eradicated 
in ourselves. There is help at hand to aid us in this work, 
if we sincerely seek and intelligently apply the agencies 
within our reach. 
Passing by, for the present, the abundant promises of 
such aid set forth in the Christian scriptures, (in which, 
perhaps, many readers, for various reasons, may repose 
little confidence,) let us see what ground exists for hope 
in the great system of things in which we live, and a 
part of which we are—those indisputable scriptures which 
are written in the laws of the universe and of our own 
being. 
First, it seems evident, on careful reflection, that the 
great forces of nature, the life-currents of the universe, 
tend to health rather than to disease—to physical, mental, 
and moral soundness, rather than to their opposites. 
Otherwise, deterioration, degradation, must have been 
the constant tendency of the race in all the past, and 23 
PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
litter extinction must long ere this have been reached. 
On the contrary, it is generally conceded that notwith- 
standing all the ignorance, disease, vice, and corruption 
that have existed through all historic time, an actual, 
though slow, improvement has taken place in both the 
physical and moral status of the human race at large 
within the historic period. 
Dr. B. W. Richardson, F. R. S., of England, in a re- 
cent address, after showing from statistics a marked in- 
crease in general longevity of human life in England and 
France in the last two hundred years, says: “Side by 
side with these facts of the statist we detect other facts 
which show that in the progress of civilization the actual 
organic strength and build of the man and woman in- 
creases. The stalwart Englishman of to-day can neither 
get into the armor nor be placed in the sarcophagi of 
those sons of men who were accounted the heroes of the 
infantile life of the human world.” A similar progress 
as regards moral attributes, such as the love of justice, 
kindness, toleration, &c.,is apparent from even a very 
superficial knowledge of history. 
The general tendency of nature to health is also seen 
in what is termed the vis medicatrix natures—the recuper- 
ative force of nature—that power present in all living 
organisms which tends at 6nce to heal every wound and 
to cure every disease, and which accomplishes these re- 
sults when not thwarted by obstacles too great to be over- 
come. Drugs and potions never heal; the most they do 
is to facilitate the operations of this inherent recuperative 
force. 
In other words, it appears that health and moral excel- 
lence are normal to human beings, while disease and evil are 
abnormal. The former are in harmony with the great 
forces of the universe, while the latter are antagonistic to 24 
PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
these forces, whose constant tendency is to overcome and 
remove them. 
Now it has been demonstrated, in the scientific propaga- 
tion of animals, that abnormal characteristics are far less 
persistent in transmission than are normal ones. The 
tendency of nature’s forces is to maintain the normal 
type. The same law doubtless obtains in the human 
species. The law that “ like begets like ” is thus subject 
to a modifying principle, and one that is full of hope for 
suffering humanity. Not alone do the evils of our nature 
tend to reproduce themselves, but by virtue of this natural 
reversion to what is normal, healthful, improving, the 
goods and excellences have a still better chance of sur- 
vival—provided adverse influences can he kept in abeyance, 
so that the salutary life-currents of the universe shall be 
unobstructed. 
How, then, may this be done ? The answer is: First, by 
RIGHT LIVING. 
We must cease to nourish the germs of physical disease 
and moral evil implanted in us by our progenitors, and 
avoid generating more of the same in ourselves. To do 
this, we must cease those unphysiological habits of diet 
and regimen in general, and those impure habits of thought 
and feeling, in which those germs have their origin. In 
other words, we must learn the laws or conditions of physical 
and moral health, and conform our lives to them. 
To be more specific, we must cease to ruin our stom- 
achs and destroy our digestive powers by the use of indi- 
gestible hot bread, pastry, greasy food, complicated and 
highly-spiced dishes, and all the many abominations of 
modern unhygienic cookery. We must abstain from 
slop-fed swine’s flesh, that prolific generator of scrofula 
and trichinae, and from the flesh of all animals slaughtered 25 
PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
in diseased conditions, or treated after slaughtering in 
such a manner as to till it with disease-producing germs— 
and this will exclude nearly all the flesh meats sold in our 
city shambles, whether fresh, salted, or dried. (In fact, 
so general has become the practice of fattening animals 
for slaughter by artificial and disease-generating pro- 
cesses, or of slaughtering them after transportation for 
long distances, subject to maddening tortures from hun- 
ger and thirst, over-crowding, and terror, that the only 
safety is in total abstinence from butchers’ meat.) We 
must also abjure those common narcotic and alcoholic 
beverages, (as tea, coffee, beer, wines, &c.,) which, under 
the guise of stimulating, only weaken and lower the tone 
of the nervous system, creating a demand for more and 
more of the same deceptive stimuli, until the unfortunate 
victim comes to imagine them “ necessaries of life.” We 
must beware, too, of inhaling the foul atmospheres of un- 
ventilated apartments, crowded assemblies, and mias- 
matic localities, which are full of morbific germs. And, 
on the other hand, we must learn to content ourselves 
with the simple, nutritious, and healthful foods, chiefly 
from the vegetable kingdom, (including, of course, the 
cereals, fruits, and nuts,) which experience shows most 
conducive to bodily soundness, mental vigor, and moral 
purity; we must be much in the open air; exercise duly 
all parts of the muscular system; dress rationally instead 
of fashionably; bathe often and thoroughly, in order to 
rid the system of effete matters which become poisonous 
by retention in the pores of the skin ; and, in short, must 
practice all those rules of hygiene which sanitary science 
has found requisite to the highest bodily health. So 
much, at least, must commend itself to the good sense of 
every reader. 
The matter of dress, above alluded to, is of far greater 26 
PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
importance to general right living—not merely during 
the period of pregnancy, but through all the previous 
life—than most people think; so great, indeed, as to jus- 
tify further remark in this connection. Any method of 
compressing the body about the waist, chest, or abdomen 
tends, as every one can perceive, to crowd the abdominal 
vicera down upon the delicate parts located in the pelvic 
region, producing irritation, inflammations, and various 
“ female weaknesses.” This devitalizes the organs of 
reproduction, and in greater or less degree unfits them 
for their proper function when called into use. It also 
greatly increases the labor and dangers of child-bearing. 
Besides, such compression, by either sex, interferes with 
the free circulation of the blood, tending to congest the 
pelvic organs, and thus to stimulate inordinate sexual ex- 
citement, leading to wasteful excesses. These tendencies 
are further aggravated by the wearing of an excessive 
amount of clothing about those portions of the body, as 
often required by fashion’s dictates, keeping them at too 
high a temperature. Men are less addicted to this prac- 
tice of compression than are women, yet the custom of 
dispensing with suspenders and tightening the lower gar- 
ments above the hips is becoming somewhat prevalent 
among young men. Corsets, even, are worn by some 
effeminate exquisites. Such fashions are unnatural and 
irrational, and will be discarded by all who are seeking a 
true life. 
It is plain to be seen that one who carefully regards 
these conditions of health stands in a far different rela- 
tion to the life-giving, health-imparting forces of the 
universe from that occupied by one who, through a dis- 
regard of these conditions, is constantly thwarting the 
recuperative tendencies of nature, and is nourishing 
and adding to the morbid proclivities derived from an- PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
27 
cestry. The former is co-operating with the beneficent 
forces of the universe on the side of health and im- 
provement ; the latter is continually antagonizing the 
same forces on the side of disease and depravation. In 
the former the tendencies to health are likely to become 
positi ve or ascendant, and hence more liable to be trans- 
mitted ; in the latter the proclivities to disease are kept 
in such constant activity that they are almost sure to re- 
produce the iselves in offspring, and often with intensi- 
fied force. 
But correct habits of diet and regimen are not the 
whole of right living. Thought and feeling should also 
be pure and elevated. There can be no question in 
minds well informed but that impure and unkind 
thoughts, debased, selfish, and malevolent feelings cher- 
ished by any one, no matter how secretly, generate a 
subtle, pvisonous virus, which envelops the person, and 
is more or less imparted to all who come in contact. 
Persons of keen and pure sensibilities often scent these 
impure and malignant atmospheres, and instinctively 
shrink from their possessors, they may not know why. 
There are good reasons for believing that many physical, 
diseases, or at least morbid tendencies, as well as moral 
perversities, have their origin in the subtle, malign influ- 
ences of impure thought and evil passion. At all events, 
it is well known that cheerful good-will and generous 
affections tend to promote health of body and mind in 
their possessor and all about him; while selfishness, 
hatred, revenge, and the like, tend in the opposite direc- 
tion. All right and pure emotions are doubtless in har- 
mony with the life-forces of the uni verse, and thus invite 
their salutary action upon the whole system; while im- 
pure and malevolent feelings are discordant with nature, 28 
PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
repellant to her diviner forces, and conducive to disorder 
and misery. 
Again, the healthful action of the universal life-currents 
in our organisms may doubtless be promoted by 
ASPIRATION. 
This is the upward-reaching faculty of our spirits—the 
“ heavenward window ” of the soul—the gateway through 
which, if held open, we may come into actual and realized 
contact with that universal life-element before referred 
to, and which is none other than the everywhere present 
“ Spirit of Good,” the inmost life of all things. The 
possession of such a faculty is sufficient reason for its use. 
This life-element must surround us on every hand and 
at all times, as does the atmosphere we breathe; and as 
the act of physical respiration is necessary to the recep- 
tion of the life-giving element of the air, so soul aspira- 
tion is necessary to the reception of that subtler and 
more vital element, which is the life of life. 
True, a certain degree of aspiration may and doubtless 
does exist, instinctively and unconsciously, with all per- 
sons, attended by a corresponding degree of influx of the 
universal life-element, without which, probably, physical 
life could not be maintained. So a low grade of physical 
life and health ma}7 and does exist where only a partial 
inflation of the physical lungs takes place, instinctively 
and unconsciously, and that even in an impure atmos- 
phere. This is the case with thousands of people who 
dwell in unventilated apartments, often ignorant that 
they so much as have lungs needing to be inflated. Yet 
all well-informed persons know that a far higher quality 
of life and health may be enjoyed through the intelligent 
practice of full respiration in a pure atmosphere. Cor- 
respondingly, no doubt, a much higher, fuller influx of PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
29 
the universal spiritual life-element may he received, 
through intelligent, earnest exercise of conscious aspira- 
tion, imparting higher vigor to the spiritual nature, and 
through that to the physical body, since the life of the 
body is from the spirit. 
This view of the rationale of aspiration and its uses, in 
one direction at least, it is believed cannot be successfully 
controverted, and it is commended to the thoughtful 
consideration of those who may have doubts as to the 
utility of prayer. If well founded, then it follows that 
here is accessible an exhaustless source of aid for human 
improvement, especially effective when sought in con- 
junction with an intelligent and careful regard for hygienic 
laws. 
Should it be alleged that many devout people have 
prayed long and earnestly for deliverance from hereditary 
maladies and other conscious imperfections, and have 
prayed in vain, it may be replied that possibly they may 
have failed at the same time to understand and apply the 
proper physical means alike necessary to the desired re- 
sult. They may have still participated, ignorantly, per- 
haps, in habits and practices which have counteracted all 
the beneficial effects of their aspirations. Such, at least, 
has been the evident fact in instances known to the writer. 
Of course, no improvement could reasonably be expected 
under such conditions. Frederick Douglass, the noted 
orator and editor, now United States marshal for the 
District of Columbia, relates that while a slave in Mary- 
land he was one‘day devoutly praying, as he often had 
done, for Divine interposition to give him the boon of 
freedom, when he heard a voice as from the skies say to 
him, “ Pray with your legs, Frederick ! Pray with your 
legs!” At length, overcoming the conscientious scruples 
which had been religiously instilled into his mind against 30 
PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
helping himself to liberty, he prayed with his leys, and the 
prayer was effectual. So, would we escape from the 
thraldom of hereditary disease or moral imperfections, 
and attain the enjoyment of a larger life and nobler 
freedom, we must not only aspire earnestly for Divine 
help, but use intelligently and persistently all the means 
appropriate to the end. 
This may not be attained in a moment, a week, or a 
year. Time may be required to produce the physiological 
changes that may be requisite. Possibly there are cases 
in which full deliverance may never be attainable in the 
body. Yet, somewhere in the boundless universe of God, 
no doubt, this boon is for all who earnestly seek it, and it 
lies unquestionably in the direction of sincere aspiration 
and faithful obedience to the laws of our being. 
There can be no question, furthermore, that a firm 
faith in the desired result, or “ assurance of the thing 
hoped for,” will aid in securing its attainment. The al- 
leged power of faith is often-sneered at by shallow people 
as a chimera of fanaticism. But they make a great mis- 
take. Its potency as a therapeutic agency is now ac- 
knowledged by the ablest and most scientific physicians. 
One of the most skillful medical men of modern times, 
who is acknowledged to stand at the head of his profes- 
sion in the treatment of nervous disorders—the famous 
Dr. Brown-Sequard—not long since said in a public lec- 
ture : “ If we physicians, who treat patients every day, 
had the power to make them believe that they are to be 
cured, especially if we could name a time for it, it would 
be a great element in success. I have succeeded some- 
times, and I can say that I succeed more than formerly, 
because I have myself the faith that I can in giving faith 
obtain a cure.” 
FAITH A RECUPERATIVE AGENCY. PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
31 
There need be no mystery about this. Faith implies 
expectation of the thing believed in ; and expectation not 
only invites the free action of the inherent recuperative 
forces of the system, but also opens the gateway for a 
fuller influx of those salvatory potencies of the universe 
before alluded to, which surround us on every side. 
And when faith can take the form of an unfaltering trust 
in an over-brooding Providence, an Almighty Parent 
who lovingly cares for all Ills children, its power is 
doubly great. 
All persons may not be gifted with the power to ex- 
ercise this trust in unseen agencies; but those who are 
may regard it as both proper and rational that they 
should avail themselves of its aid, despite the doubts and 
sneers of the faithless. They will find, doubtless, that as 
their faith is, so will be the result to them. Faith, more- 
over, like every other human faculty, is capable of culti- 
vation, so that those who lack may b}7 proper means ob- 
tain an increase. The mere possibility that through the 
means thus suggested the germinal elements of disease 
and of moral evil in our own natures may be either 
eradicated or rendered inert, so that they shall not be 
transmitted to others, while, on the other hand, the forces 
of health and of good shall become ascendant, and thus 
likely to be imparted to offspring—such a possibility, 
even, should be a powerful stimulus to strive for its re- 
alization. 
But there are still greater possibilities than even this. 
Faith, with pure aspiration or earnest yearning for the 
highest good, is not only a potent, uplifting force in itself, 
but it is no doubt a great help to produce a eon- 
tion of receptivity or openness to the action of supernal 
powers, which renders possible many things that to a 
HIGHER POSSIBILITIES. 32 
PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
groveling and blind materialism are not attainable. It 
has already been abundantly shown that the embryo 
child may be powerfully affected and moulded by the 
mental and psychical action of the mother. It is plain, 
therefore, that any mental or psychical influence acting 
upon the mother will, through her, also strongly affect her 
offspring, and be likely to shape its future characteristics. 
The following fact, illustrative of this point, was con- 
tributed by the author to the columns of the Alpha 
some months since, but is worthy of repetition here for 
the important lesson it teaches: 
“Not long since I met with a venerable lady, of marked intelli- 
gence and spirituality, who had formerly been for many years a 
preacher in the Society of Friends. From her 1 obtained a narra- 
tion of some interesting facts in her pre-natal history, as she had 
derived them from her mother. They were to the following effect: 
“ Some months previous to her birth, and while anticipating that 
event, her mother, who was a Quakeress, had become exceedingly 
despondent and oppressed with gloomy forebodings, in consequence 
of severe domestic trials. Poverty, privation and disgrace seemed 
to stare her in the face, in connection with this expected increase 
of family. While in a state of mind bordering on despair, a prom- 
inent Friend called upon her one day, bringing with him two or 
three copies of a new book just published. This was the journal 
of a distinguished Quaker preacher, then recently deceased, who 
had passed through great vicissitudes and dangers in the perform- 
ance of the mission to which he had felt himself called, but had 
been wonderfully supported through all by an unfaltering trust in 
God. 
“ The mother at once seized upon one of these books, with a 
strong interior feeling that in it was help and hope for her. She 
obtained a copy, and almost literally devoured its contents. It 
brought to her the needed help. In its perusal she seemed to be 
lifted up into intimate sympa’hy with its author, and to partake of 
the same calm trust and unfaltering faith which iiad sustained him 
in life. Her fears and forebodings all disappeared, never again to 
return, and she received in some way a premonition that her forth- 
coming child would be a daughter, and would prove a great help 
and comfort to her through life. 
“ This premonition proved true. The daughter at an early age pre-natal culture. 
33 
showed a remarkable predisposition to spiritual concerns, and in 
due time became an acceptable preacher in the society, notably re- 
sembling in many respects the one whose biography had so deeply 
impressed the mother during the period of gestation ; and she was 
able to provide a pleasant home for her mother for more than fifty 
years of her later life.” 
The comments appended to the above narrative can 
hardly be improved upon here, and hence they are copied 
entire : 
“ This narrative is valuable for the suggestion it gives of possible 
aids that may be available by mothers in the most important work 
of pre-natal culture. The psychological influence which a mother 
may exert over the embryo in exalted mental and spiritual states* 
induced by reading, meditation or aspiration, is now generally un- 
derstood and admitted, and it is surety a powerful instrumentality 
for good. But it is possible there is something more than this. 
Readers who believe in a future life of love and service for those 
who have passed within the veil—that they who have delighted to 
labor for and bless humanity while in the flesh may and do become 
angels to minister to those they leave behind, after they have 
passed the portal of the higher life—certainty such need have no 
difficulty in supposing that benign immortals will be glad to render 
their services, when practicable and desired, in so momentous a 
work as the ante-natal shaping and moulding of a human being for 
a career of distinguished usefulness on earth. 
“The mother above alluded to became deeply conscious at times, 
as stated, of close rapport and soul-communion with the esteemed 
friend whose life-story so uplifted her mind. Many others have 
had similar experiences regarding departed friends. Nothing is 
more reasonable than that two souls thus sympathizing should 
gravitate to each other, even though one has thrown ofl'tlie incum- 
brance of the flesh. And if the departed preacher was thus drawn 
to be actually present with this mother at this important period, it 
would be scarcely avoidable that he, through her, should exercise 
a powerful psychical influence over the then forming embryo. 
And this would explain why the daughter developed a tendency to 
become a preacher of the same type as himself. 
“ I might add that this lady informed me that in later years she 
had received evidence which fully convinced her, not only that such 
psychical influence was exerted by the disembodied preacher, but 
that he purposely selected her while in the fetal state, watched 34 
PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
over and prepared her for the special service of becoming his 
mouth-piece in completing his earthly work, and in due time had 
employed her for that purpose. And this fully accounts for the 
completeness with which he had represented him in her public min- 
istrations. 
“ To some persons such a conviction will doubtless seem wild 
and incredible ; but to the thoughtful and spiritually-minded, I am 
sure, there is nothing intrinsically improbable in it. If there is any 
truth in the ancient promise, 4 He shall give His angels charge over 
thee,’ &c., in what more important matter can their guardian care 
be exercised than in that of assisting a conscientious mother in her 
most responsible work of moulding a young imrortal for a life of 
usefulness and honor? 
“ When mothers shall come to feel the true dignity of the office 
of maternity, (if worthily entered upon,) they may know that all 
the powers of good in the universe are on their side, and ready to 
contribute to a noble and successful issue.” 
In view of such experiences, it seems not too much to 
believe, as many do, that through the appropriate exercise 
of faith and aspiration, especially if accompanied by right 
living in all respects, intending mothers may attain a con- 
dition of plasticity to holy influences from the unseen 
world—which are ever seeking to improve and bless our 
race—that may result in the production of offspring of a 
type superior to average humanity. It is not impossible 
that such a state of self-abnegation and sweet surrender 
to the will of the Highest may be reached, as that this 
higher and wiser will may come in and work to grander 
and completer results than the most intelligent mother of 
herself would be capable of effecting. In this way, it 
may be, the plan of self-training and positive endeavor, 
to be suggested in subsequent pages of this treatise, may 
be largely superseded by what is better. Surely, thus to 
become a willing and plastic instrument through which 
the Highest may work unobstructedly “ both to will and 
to do,” and to co-operate energetically with the infinite 
will, is doubtless the most desirable state to which a 
mortal can aspire. PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
35 
It seems not improbable that in the way thus suggested, 
that is, through the instrumentality of matrons specially 
receptive to these hallowing influences, no matter how 
lowly their estate in other regards, nor even how ignor- 
ant of the law or process involved, have been gestated 
and brought forth the grandest and noblest souls that 
have illuminated the pathway of humanity in all time. 
She whom all generations with one consent have called 
“ blessed”—the mother of the Nazarene—appears to have 
been a prominent example. The folloving passages from 
her song of thanksgiving (Luke i, 46-55) are highly sig- 
nificant : 
“ My soul doth magnify the Lord, 
And my spirit hath rejoiced in G-od my Saviour, 
Tor he hath regarded the low estate of his hand-maiden ; 
For, behold, from henceforth all generations shall call me blessed. 
For he that is mighty hath done me great things, 
And holy is his name, 
And his mercy is on them that fear him 
From generation to generation. 
He hath showed strength with his arm ; 
He hath scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts ; 
He hath put down the mighty from their seats, 
And exalted them of low degree.” 
If it be a fact that in the manner above indicated, off- 
spring of a type superior to their parents, either physically, 
mentally or morally, are produced, it by no means follows 
that the law of heredity (“ like begets like”) is contra- 
vened. This law only receives a higher expression. 
Through the agency of the parents, and especially of the 
mother, as the result of pure aspirations, strong faith, 
right living, with other favoring conditions, better ger- 
minal elements are secreted and brought in conjunction, 
and these are vitalized from a higher spiritual source. 
Improved specimens of humanity are a natural sequence. 
This suggests the probable law or method of ascending 
progress in the evolution of not only the human race but 
of all living forms on this planet. Higher types may 36 
PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
have been successively generated, not by some mysterious 
process of accidental or spontaneous evolution, but by the 
bringing together, under favoring conditions, of improved 
germinal elements—improved perhaps by the infusion of 
subtle spiritual essences that introduce new qualities. 
This process may have been, not merely chance-directed, 
as some imagine, but, on the contrary, presided over by 
intelligent and wise design, working on a broad field to 
determinate ends. “ Differentiation of species” may, in- 
deed, have been effected by the “ environment,”as claimed 
by materialistic philosophers; but the presence of an all- 
surrounding spiritual life-element in the universe (the 
existence of which seems almost a necessary truth of in- 
tuition) is an important factor of the environment which 
is generally ignored by this class of thinkers. 
If the foregoing suggestions are well founded, then 
there is 
HOPE FOR ALL, 
based in the very constitution of things. Improvement 
for the individual and for the race is possible, and that 
without limit. The grand energies of the universe are in 
its favor. In our ills and weaknesses, our conscious base- 
nesses and evil proclivities, inherited though they may 
have been from a long line of ancestry, we need not lie 
prone and helpless, with no alternative (except in rare 
instances) but either to transmit these hateful qualities to 
our offspring, or to refrain from the supreme joy of repro- 
ducing ourselves. Help, purification, regeneration are 
within reach, in most cases at least, if we will but avail 
ourselves of the means. 
A PARENTAL PROVIDENCE. 
It would not be difficult to show, without appealing to 
what is termed “ revealed religion,” the strong proba- PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
37 
bility, if not certainty, that this helpful and uplifting 
Energy which has been referred to as encompassing us on 
every hand, is something more than a blind, unintelli- 
gent, unsympathetic “ force ;” that it is in fact a Parental 
Providence, a brooding tenderness, which yearns with un- 
failing love to bless, to enlighten, to redeem from every 
ill, to enrich with every good. But to argue this ques- 
tion at length would be foreign to our present purpose; 
suffice it to say that the belief or intuition of such a 
Providence seems to have been consentaneous in the best 
and grandest souls that have ever dwelt in human clay, 
those whose hearts have been attuned to feel the sympa- 
thetic throbs of the Universal Heart. 
Whether this benign Power be conceived of as a 
“ Cosmical Life,” in which we, and all we see around us, 
have our “unsearchable roots,” as expressed by a leading 
scientist of the day, (Tyndall,) or as an all-embracing 
“ Oversoul, within which every man’s particular being is 
contained,” as a modern transcendental philosopher 
(Emerson) has phrased it; or as a universal Parent, a per- 
sonal being, with attributes sufficiently expansive to in- 
clude all minor personalities within his own, according 
to the best interpretation of the Christian teachings ; or 
as a vast assemblage of apotheosized human spirits, per- 
fected in purity, wisdom and goodness, acting as vice- 
gerents of the Supreme Will and Wisdom in this rudi- 
mental sphere, as many in all ages have believed— 
whichever of these conceptions be adopted as most satis- 
factory to the individual mind, a like result follows, 
namely, that in the constitution of things which exists, 
kindly aid from a superior source is available to all who 
seek it rightly in all important human concerns. In 
other words, that we are not orphans, held in the grasp 
of an unpitying fate, but children, watched over and cared 38 
PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
for with parental love and far-seeing wisdom. 
Can we 'suppose that' this parental oversight extends 
to ' the" matter of begetting and rearing of offspring ? 
Why should it not ? Is not this one of the most impor- 
tant of human concerns ? The Great Teacher of Judea, 
whose intuitive soul seems to have been most deeply 
permeated with a sense of the parental character of the 
taught that It, or He, takes note of so tri- 
fling an event as the falling of a sparrow, and even num- 
bers the very hairs of our heads. We may perhaps re- 
gard, this as an extravagant example of Oriental hyper- 
bole, yet if it embodies even a grain of truth we must 
infer that so momentous an occurrence as the initiation 
of an immortal being, to exist for good or ill through the 
eternities, whose life is of vastly greater value than all 
tha sparrows in the world, is not too insignificant for 
supernal cognizance. The preponderance of the argu- 
ment in favor of such cognizance is in the ratio of the 
value of the whole human being as compared with that 
of a single hair. Why, then, should not the origin of 
every human being be attended by 
THE DIVINE OVERSHADOWING ? 
The record informs us that in the case of Jesus him- 
self, when His mother questioned the announcement of 
the angel that she should bring forth a son, and He 
shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the High- 
est,” she was assured that “ the Holy Ghost shall come 
upon thee, and the power of the Highest shall overshadow 
thee, therefore also that holy thing shall he born of thee 
shall he called the Son of God.” 
This has, indeed, been generally regarded as an alto- 
gether exceptional experience in the history of humanity, 
and one never to be repeated. But was it really and pre-natAl CULTURE. 
39 
wholly such? Why should not every mother feel the 
uplifting and purifying presence of the Divine Spirit, and 
he overshadowed by the power of the Highest in prepar- 
ing herself for and in discharging the most sacred of all 
functions? Most surely it may be so, if she ear- 
nestly aspire for it. And why, then, as a result in ac- 
cordance with the law of psychical impresssion, should 
not every child born be a holy one, and worthy to be 
called a son or daughter of the Highest? Verily, this 
might he so, were the human instruments reverently to 
yield themselves to the will of the Highest, that this will, 
instead of the will of the flesh, may be done in and 
through them. 
SPECIAL INTERIOR LEADINGS. 
Facts and experiences that have come to the writer’s 
knowledge, as well as general considerations of desirable- 
ness, point to the conclusion that a woman who earnestly 
seeks to be led by the Divine Spirit, or by her own 
“ spiritual intuitions,” or the “ inward monitor,” or “ in- 
ner light,” if any prefer these terms, in the important 
matters of choosing a conjugal partner" and of entrance 
upon the maternal function, will be guided by a wisdom 
higher than herself. If she will carefully shut out all 
other voices and influences, and: listen only to the oracle 
within the inmost shrine, she may be led infallibly to 
choose the proper companion, and at the proper time will 
And herself being prepared, in body and mind, by a 
power wiser than herself, for assuming the noble duty of 
motherhood. 
And until this interior leading, this fulness of prepara- 
tion, with the Divine 'overshadowing, is felt, no one 
should ever venture upon' the sacred function—certainly 
never against the voice of “the inward monitor. It is 40 
PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
profanation, sacrilege thus to do ! Unquestionably it is 
because, amid the clamors of passion, the blandishments 
of flattery, the urgency of unwise persuasion, or the pres- 
sure of other unworthy considerations, the “still, small 
voice” is unheeded, the divine guidance unsought, that 
so many wretched mis-alliances are formed, and such 
numbers ot unwelcome, malformed, diseased, sin-cursed 
and unholy offspring are brought into the world. 
That the masculine parent, if he also seeks to obey the 
monitions of the spirit rather than the desires of the 
flesh, may experience a corresponding internal prepara- 
tion for paternity, is doubtless true—though men for the 
most part are less conscious of these delicate spiritual 
leadings than are women. Hence men, as a general rule, 
should defer to women in these matters, especially to 
those of keen spiritual intuitions. But the preparation 
on man’s part, if earnestly sought, may be no less real, 
though it be less fully sensed. And on no consideration 
should one ever enter the sacred relation whence parent- 
age may result without due preparation in himself. 
Especially should he refrain from ever intruding, by 
either demand or solicitation, against the intuitions of the 
partner. All such intrusions are outrages of the most 
flagrant character, the same in essence as positive physical 
violence, and the same within as without the legal mar- 
riage relation. Offspring begotten when any degree of 
reluctance or want of preparation exists on the part of 
the mother, are robbed of a portion of their birth-right, 
and to that degree incapacitated for the full enjoyment of 
existence. That birth-right includes a full and loving 
welcome to the world. Without this, what a pitiable 
object is a child!—virtually orphaned and outcast from 
its earliest heart-throb, liable to be followed through life 
by a sense of homelessness and friendlessness, a life-long PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
41 
mourner in a vale of team! But a child wisely desired, 
intelligently prepared for, begotten in sweet mutual love, 
properly cultured in embryo, and at length joyfully wel- 
comed to loving arms, such a one is an object of interest 
and joy to all humanity. At the advent of such, even 
though born in a stable and cradled in a manger, well 
may choiring angels sing, “ Glory to God in the highest, 
on earth peace and good will to men.” For of such are 
the wise teachers, the noble examples, the loving saviors 
of mankind! 
ADAPTATIONS. 
There are reasons for believing that many of the ail- 
ments and sufferings commonly incident to maternity— 
such as the nausea, the “ longings,” the general physical 
disturbances, as well as the mental and moral disorders 
sometimes exhibited—result from either unwelcome and 
undesired impregnation at an improper time, or from a 
conjunction of unadapted elements ; that is if persons not 
adapted in the finer constituents of their organisms come 
together in that intimate relation. When this is the case 
what wonder that internal rebellion and general physical 
disorder follow ? 
If woman was made for maternity, as the conformation 
of her organism and the normal tendency of her strong- 
est instincts, with few exceptions, show, then it is evident 
that the proper exercise of this function should be attended 
by the highest health, enjoyment and happiness. And 
thus it is in many cases. That it is not so in any case in- 
dicates that something is wrong, that the kindly purpose 
of nature has been thwarted at some point. 
This question of adaptations or compatibilities between 
those who would enter the parental relation, though often 
sneered at by short-sighted moralists, deserves greater at- 42 
PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
tention than it has yet received. The popular notion is 
that if two persons are only of opposite sexes and not 
within certain legally prescribed relations of consanguinity, 
they are fit to marry and to beget offspring. This is a 
great mistake. There are finer conditions of adaptation 
and of incongruity which may not appear on the surface 
but are inwoven in the very texture of being; and which, 
if disregarded, will assert themselves in their own time 
and way as surely as will the laws of chemical affinity and 
repulsion. These are nature’s or God’s laws of marriage 
and divorce, and where they are unheeded in a legal 
contract, it cannot be said that “ God hath joined” the 
parties together. The converse of the precept enunciated 
by Jesus is no doubt equally binding, namely, what God 
hath put asunder by inherent repugnances, let no man 
or woman attempt to join together ! 
But so little is this subject understood that perhaps few, 
if any, can judge with infallible accuracy, from external 
indications, what individuals are or are not properly 
adapted for this relation. Yet it is believed that a patient 
waiting for interior guidance, a listening to the voice of 
the soul’s intuitions, rather than to external inducements 
of any kind, will be found, especially on the part of 
women, a tolerably safe guide as to these finer adapta- 
tions, enabling them to determine wisely not only when 
but whom to marry. 
Other important details of preparation might be dwelt 
upon, but as these have been presented to some extent in 
a previous treatise, The Better Way, they will not be re- 
peated here. 
METHODS OF EMBRYO CULTURE. 
Should such preparations for parentage as have been 
suggested in preceding pages be in any good measure 
attained, it is probable that results of a very desirable PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
43 
character would be realized without recourse to any de- 
tailed plan of embryo culture as outlined in what is to fol- 
low. But yet it is apparent.that if these are succeeded 
by the wise and judicious use of such further means as 
are within the power of parents, and especially of 
mothers during gestation, still more complete results may 
be assured. We will, therefore, proceed to give some 
outline of a course of regimen and self-training, which 
seems adapted, in accordance with the apparent laws of 
physical and psychical influence, to affect most favorably 
the character and qualities of the child. 
The importance of order in the method employed has 
already been indicated. What that order shall be, the 
mother may doubtless infer, in a general way, by observ- 
ing the order in which the several classes of faculties 
naturally unfold and arrive at maturity after birth, during 
the periods of childhood, youth, etc. Let us then at- 
tempt a classification of human instincts and faculties in 
the general order of their development. This appears to 
be somewhat as follows : 
First. The Vital and Self-Preservative Instincts, which 
form the basis of individual existence, are the earliest to 
manifest themselves. The infant simply eats and grows. 
Second. The Domestic and Social Affections ordinarily 
come next into prominent activity. The child begins to 
love its parents and care-takers. 
Third. The Perceptive and Observing Faculties, with 
which are associated the Retentive and Recording, are 
next markedly developed. The child observes and re- 
members. 
Fourth. The Constructive and Beautifying Faculties 
next display themselves. The child shows a disposition 
to make things and to ornament. 
Fifth. The Directive and Regulative Faculties, includ- 44 
PRE-NATAL CULlURh. 
ing the reflective intellect and the moral powers, come 
into activity. The youth begins to reason, and to feel 
strongly the force of moral obligations. 
Sixth. The Humane or Philanthropic impulse asserts 
its sway; and, 
Seventh. The Aspirational, Worshipful, or Upward- 
looking tendency usually comes latest to maturity. 
It is by no means claimed that human development in 
any case follows strictly this order, nor that it should be 
followed by mothers in any such rigid way as to exclude 
all attention to any one department out of the course 
named. On the contrary, the several steps or stages will 
merge more or less into each other, and some exercises 
will doubtless be at all times in place. But it is plainly 
out of natural order, for instance, to stimulate the activity 
of the Reasoning faculties before the Vital forces are well 
established, or even before the Perceptive or Observing 
powers have been duly cultivated. Such a process would 
be in reverse of the order of nature, and its tendency is 
to produce physical weaklings and intellectual dreamers, 
who incline to ignore the solid facts of existence and live 
i?i the regions of speculation. A vigorous body is de- 
sirable as the basis of a vigorous mind, and habits of ac- 
curate observation are an essential pre-requisite to sound 
reasoning. 
Again, it is evident that in an}7 effort by a mother to 
cultivate her offspring in embryo through her own mental 
and physical action, she needs to give more especial at- 
tention to those desirable qualities, faculties or tendencies 
which may be deficient in herself, or in the hither, and 
most especially such as may happen to be deficient in 
both. Those powers whose activity is in excess in either 
parent, and those also whose activity is spontaneous and 
easy are likely to be transmitted without special effort. 45 
PRE-ttATAL CULlURE. 
The more difficult it is, then, to exercise any desirable fac- 
ulty in either parent, the greater the need of its exercise in 
the mother during gestation, in order that the offspring may 
not suffer from the deficiency. 
To give specific directions for the culture of each and 
every faculty, when deficient, would extend this treatise 
far beyond its proposed limits, but a few general sug- 
gestions will enable the intelligent reader to clearly ap- 
prehend the method, and to make the application as re- 
quired in the individual case. 
Every one can readily understand that any oft-repeated 
exercise of muscle or of mental faculty (unless over-done) 
tends to develop and strengthen such muscle or faculty. 
It does this in the mother, and, if the law of fetal mold- 
ing has been correctly stated in the foregoing pages, it 
must have the same effect through the mother upon the 
embryo. For example, if the mother (at the proper stage 
in pregnancy) takes care to exercise her own muscles 
freely by walking, light gymnastics, bathing, etc., the 
probabilities are, other things being favorable, that she 
will thereby not only improve her own health, but at the 
same time confer upon her child a vigorous muscular sys- 
tem. If she, at the proper time, exercises her mind 
somewhat persistently, for example, in reckoning or calcu- 
lating numbers, she will thereby increase her owm arithmet- 
ical facult}7, and simultaneously increase the molecular 
deposits in that part of the fetal brain which is the organ of 
calculation, according to modern phrenology—at all events 
will be likely to confer upon her child the power to be- 
come a good arithmetician. If the mother spends any 
considerable portion of her time in philosophic study or 
thought, in efforts to understand the “ whys and where- 
fores of things,” she thereby exercises and expands her own 
cause-discerning faculty, (Causality,) and insures its activ- 46 
PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
ity in her offspring. So, if she practices thoughtful and 
unselfish kindness toward those about her, and is benevo- 
lent to the needy and the suffering, she enstamps the 
same noble trait (Benevolence) upon the unborn ; and if 
she at all times firmly adheres to the right because it is 
right, she keeps her own conscience ever clear, and im- 
parts to the coming one that priceless quality, Conscien- 
tiousness. So of all the other faculties. 
In short, reading, thought, conversation or any employ- 
ment which occupies the mind in any special direction, 
and thus calls into prolonged exercise any specific faculty 
or set of faculties in the mother, must tend to modify the 
mental and cerebral development of the embryo in such 
a way as in all probability will determine, to a large ex- 
tent, its capacities and tendencies in all after-life. The 
whole matter is thus simple and comprehensible to the 
most ordinary capacity. 
Where any one faculty or tendency is in excess of a 
well-balanced character, in either of the parents, and defi- 
cient in the other, it may reasonably be expected that the 
excess on the one side may be counterbalanced by the 
lack on the other—except when, as is sometimes the case, 
one parent overwhelmingly preponderates over the other 
in imparting the characteristics of the child—a result due, 
perhaps, to the possession of greater physical or mental 
vigor at the time of inception. 
Where the same faculties or tendencies are in excess 
in both parents, the probabilities are that the excess will 
be increased in the offspring to the extent, perhaps, of 
creating a deformity or an undesirable one-sidedness of 
character. In such a case, the propriety of restraint, in- 
stead of culture, would seem to be apparent. But it is 
suggested that such restraint may best be sought indi- 
rectly ; that is, by special efforts to cultivate and exercise PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
47 
the opposite or counterbalancing faculties, rather than to 
attempt repression by direct exercise of the will on the 
excessive tendency. For example, should the selfish 
proclivities or passions tend to inordinate activity, en- 
deavor to cultivate and exercise more fully the faculties 
classed as Directive and Regulative—that is, the Reasoning 
powers, the Conscience and Benevolence. This will be 
leveling up instead of down, thus making more of the 
whole man or woman by enlarging the better side. Be- 
sides, it is probable that fixing the mind upon any partic- 
ular faculty or propensity, in an effort to repress its action 
by direct will-force, may tend, by sending the vital fluids 
to the cerebral organ of such faculty, to increase rather 
than diminish its activity; whereas, the drawing of these 
fluids to other parts of the brain, by increasing the activity 
of the latter, will naturally lessen the action in those 
which it is desirable to repress. This, doubtless, furnishes 
the reason why efforts to overcome inordinate appetites 
by force of will are so seldom successful. 
Where deficiencies exist in the same faculties in both 
parents, of course there wall be required more assiduous 
attention to the means of culture by the mother, if she 
would have these deficiencies supplied, and her offspring 
saved from the disabilities and misfortunes that are likely 
to result. 
If the foregoing suggestions are at all in the right di- 
rection, it plaiidy follows that it behooves all prospective 
parents, and especially mothers, who would confer upon 
their children healthful and well-balanced organisms, to 
first thoroughly know themselves. ISTot only should they 
intelligently understand their own respective physical 
conditions, as regards healthfulness, adaptation of tem- 
peraments, constitutional tendencies, etc., but also they 
should have a just estimate of their own mental powers 48 
PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
and moral characteristics in all particulars. And since 
few persons are competent to know themselves accurately 
in either of the above-named respects, it is well to con- 
sult with intelligent and judicious friends, or with com- 
petent professional advisers, if such can be found, who 
are skilled in the detection of physical, mental and moral 
characteristics, and will faithfully point out both defects 
and redundances. It may be true that there are few 
persons now to be found in any of our communities who 
are fully qualified to give needed advice in these momen- 
tous matters; but it is believed that as public attention 
shall be turned in this direction, and the want become 
felt, such advisers will appear.* 
SPECIFIC SUGGESTIONS. 
We will now proceed to indicate some more specific 
measures which seem adapted to the several successive 
stages into which embryo culture may be divided, in ac- 
cordance with the suggestion already made regarding an 
orderly method of procedure. 
First Stage. It seems scarcely to admit of question that 
the first thing to be done, in the order of time, is to se- 
cure to the new immortal the basis of a good physical or- 
ganization, with strong vital powers. If the parents, and 
especially the mother, have given proper attention to their 
own personal preparation in all respects, as hereinbefore 
suggested, a good beginning will have been made. But 
the mother should endeavor by all means to maintain 
throughout the whole period of gestation the best possible 
condition of bodily health and vigor. Neither too much 
labor or care, nor too little, should be undertaken. Dur- 
ing the earlier months, while the foundations, so to speak, 
who may desire more full directions, relative to methods of cul- 
ture for each faculty, will And very valuable suggestions in a small volume, 
entitled “Row to Read Character," by the late Dr. S. R. Wells. (New York: 
1873.) PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
49 
of the child’s physical constitution are being laid, open- 
air exercise, gymnastics, bathing, riding, travel, with the 
best diet, proper dress, cheerful companionship ; in short 
everything that will contribute to the highest physical 
vigor, should be availed of as far as practicable. At 
later stages a greater amount of repose and seclusion is 
naturally sought, and travel and the more active forms of 
exercise cannot so well be participated in. 
Let it he here remarked parenthetically, that it is not 
expected every mother in ordinary circumstances in life 
will be able to comply with every suggestion here made. 
It is desirable, however, that all should know what are 
the best conditions required to produce the best results ; 
and then each should make the nearest approximation 
thereto that individual circumstances will admit. And 
no argument seems necessary to show that all should 
seek to secure reasonably favorable conditions before 
entering upon so important an undertaking as parentage. 
The highest welfare of the unborn, and not the pleasure 
of the parents, should be cliietiy considered. And when 
neighborhoods and communities shall have come to give 
this subject the consideration its importance demands, it 
will be found an easy matter to secure, by combination 
and co-operation, conditions which the individual means 
of isolated families often do not enable them to supply. 
In fact, the noble office of maternity must sometime come 
to be regarded as a most sacred and honorable function, 
in the proper discharge of which the whole community 
has a direct interest. And those who are fitted for its 
worthy performance, and who are willing intelligently 
and lovingly to undertake it, are entitled to both the 
profound respect and the helpful co-operation of all others. 
Besides, there is little question that a proper attention 
to the laws of health, as regards diet, regimen, clothing, 50 
PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
etc., will secure to any well-organized and well-mated 
woman exemption from most, if not all, of the sufferings 
and dangers now usually considered incident to child-hear- 
ing. If it be true, according to popular belief, that woman’s 
“ sorrows” in this function have been greatly “ multi- 
plied,” in consequence of the first mother’s trangression, 
it is no doubt equally true (for it rests on quite as 
good authority) that “ she shall he saved in child-bearing 
if they continue in faith and charity and holiness with sobri- 
ety” (I Tim. ii: 15.) “Holiness” should mean nothing 
less than wholeness, or compliance with all the laws of 
one’s being. An experienced and highly intelligent 
mother, well known throughout our country—Mrs. Eliz- 
abeth Cady Stanton—in a note to the writer, says : 
In right conditions maternity will not be a period of weakness, 
sorrow and suffering, but of joy, health and added power. A well- 
organized woman can bring a child into the world without suffer- 
ing. The idea of woman being cursed by Heaven in her relations 
of wife and mother is a monstrous idea, and has had a most de- 
pressing and degrading influence upon woman in all ages. 
The same capable matron, in one of her lectures to 
women some years since, gave the following important 
personal testimony : 
I am the mother of seven children. My girlhood was spent 
mostly in the open air. I early imbibed the idea that a girl is just 
as good as a boy, and I carried it out. I would walk five miles 
before breakfast, or ride ten on horseback. After I was married I 
wore my clothing sensibly. Its weight hung entirely on my 
shoulders. I never compressed my body out of its natural shape. 
When my first four children were born I suffered very little. I 
then made up my mind that it was totally unnecessary for me to 
suffer at all; so I dressed lightly, walked every day, lived as much 
as possible in the open air, ate no condiments or spices, kept quiet? 
listened to music, looked at pictures and took proper care of myself. 
The night before the birth of the child I walked three miles. The 
child was born without a particle of pain. L bathed it and dressed 
it, and it weighed ten and a half pounds. That same day I dined 
with the family, Everybody said I would surely die, but I never 
had a relapse or a moment’s inconvenience from it. PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
51 
The question what constitutes the best diet during 
pregnancy, has been fully discussed in hygienic works, 
and cannot be treated at length here. The good sense of 
every reader will suggest that the diet ought to be regu- 
lated, not by custom or fashion, or the dictates of a per- 
verted appetite, but by a thoughtful and intelligent con- 
sideration of what is best adapted to supply the needs and 
promote the healthy functions of the organism, with 
special adaptations to the circumstance of the case.* 
During the earlier stages of pregnancy, as well as at 
all subsequent periods, it is desirable that the mother have 
at hand, for frequent contemplation, some of the best 
works of art, in statuary, or pictures, or both, as models 
of the beautiful and graceful in form, aqd of the amiable 
and noble in expression. Perhaps some one admired 
figure may be chosen to be copied by the mother’s won- 
derful electrotyping power in her living work of art; but 
care should be taken that it be one in which goodness as 
well as physical beauty is bodied forth. 
In this is to be found one of the noblest uses of art; 
and there can be no doubt that the works of the great 
masters have had more effect than the world imagines in 
producing and multiplying forms of beauty and manliness 
through impressions made on the minds of matrons. 
Every Bible reader is familiar with the shrewd plan 
adopted by the patriarch Jacob, by which he greatly mul- 
*Since the above was written the author has met with a small but valuable 
work entitled, “ Parturition Without Pain,” by Dr. M. L. Holbrook, who has 
adduced facts to show that a diet during pregnancy consisting chiefly of fruits, 
with such other foods as contain little or none of the phosphates, (i. e., bone- 
making materials,) will cause the bones of the fetus to remain so soft and pli- 
able till the time of birth, that parturition will be attended with little incon- 
venience to the mother; while proper attention to other hygienic rules will se- 
cure immunity from most, if not all, of the ailments and dangers commonly at- 
tendant upon child-bearing. Of course, immediately after the child is born, 
the mother should partake freely of bone-making food, such as wheaten 
bread, milk, etc. This statement seems worthy of careful attention and test. 
The book gives a full list of foods, classified with reference to the amount of 52 
PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
tiplied the increase of cattle of a particular description 
(“ ring-straked, spotted and speckled”) in the flocks of 
his father-in-law, to his own gain. (Gen. xxx: 27, etc.) 
Why should not the same law be generally availed of for 
the nobler purpose of conferring forms of beauty and grace- 
fulness upon human offspring ? 
It is said that travelers in Italy, that land of paintings 
and sculpture, are often struck with the frequency with 
which the lovely features of the Madonna are to he seen 
in the faces of children of even the uncultured peasantry. 
When it is remembered that almost every church and 
chapel in that country is provided with a representation 
of a Virgin and Child, from the hand often of some master 
of the noble art, and that these pictures are regarded with 
devout reverence by the common people, it is easy to see 
whence come those beautiful faces of Italian children. 
The several specific instincts or propensities of the 
Vital and Self-Preservative group, included in our first- 
class, are, according to the phrenological system, 
termed as follows: 1. Vitativeness, or love and te- 
nacity of life; 2. Alimentiveness, desire for and enjoy- 
ment of food; 3. Destructiveness, or executive power, 
ability to overcome obstacles ; 4. Combativeness, or self- 
defense ; 5. Acquisitiveness, or disposition- to own and ac- 
cumulate; 6. Secretiveness, tact, ability to keep one’s 
own counsel. 
This analysis and these definitions, let it be remarked, 
may be neither strictly accurate nor exhaustive, yet 
they may answer practical purposes until better can 
be furnished. And the same remarks apply to all the 
groupings and definitions to be hereafter given. The 
phosphates they contain, as well as much other valuable information, and 
should be in the hands of all parents. Dr. Holbrook’s “ Eating fur Strength 
and Dr. Cowan’s “ Science of n New Life ” also contain further valuable hygi- 
enic instructions. PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
53 
phrenological analysis and nomenclature of instincts and 
faculties is used here, not because it is entirely satisfactory, 
but because it appears better adapted to the purpose in 
view than any other which the author has met with. 
It should be noted that none of the propensities above 
specified, when rightly defined, can be dispensed with in 
a fully rounded character. They are not evil in them- 
selves, nor are their organs (if such exist) “bad organs,” 
as some have supposed. It is their overplus, or over- 
action as compared with that of others, that is bad. A 
deficiency in any one of these basic instincts of human 
nature constitutes in that particular a weak and deficient 
character. 
Second Stage.—Next in order after the Vital instincts, 
and to some extent simultaneously with them, comes the 
development of the Domestic and Social Affections, or 
the Loves. These precede, in a general way, the mani- 
festations of Intellect. That is, the child ordinarily loves 
before it reasons to any extent. It would seem appropri- 
ate, therefore, that the mother, before applying herself to 
special exercises for intellectual culture, should see to it 
that any deficiencies that may exist in the Afifectional 
department are provided against, as far as may be, by ap- 
propriate self-training. If her own personal affections are 
kept in lively and well-balanced exercise, she may expect 
that her offspring will be well endowed in this depart- 
ment. 
The several divisions of the Afifectional group of facul- 
ties recognized by phrenologists are the following: 1, 
Amativeness, or attachment to the opposite sex ; 2, Con- 
jugality, desire to pair, or love for the partner ; 3, Parental 
Love, (Philoprogenitiveness,) or love of children and 
pots ; 4, Adhesiveness, (Friendship,) attachment to friends; 
5, Inkabitivencss, love of home and country. 54 
PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
Third Stage.—Next in natural order of prominent 
activity, appear to come the Observing or Perceptive 
powers, intimately associated with which are the Com- 
municative and the Retentive or Recording faculties. 
These, as designated by phrenologists, are: 1, Individ- 
uality, or power to individualize or distinguish and sepa- 
rately observe objects (the investigating faculty;) 2, Form, 
or perception of shapes, outlines, memory of faces, etc. ; 
3, Size, the power to notice and remember dimensions; 
4, Weight, or perception of forces; 5, Color, appreciation 
and love of colors, tints, etc. ; 6, Order, love of arrange- 
ment, system; 7, Calculation, or perception of numbers 
and their relations (the arithmetical faculty7;) 8, Eventual- 
ity, memory of events, facts, dates, etc., (the historic 
faculty;) 9, Locality, observation and memory of places, 
scenery, directions, etc., (the geographical faculty;) 10, 
Time, sense of duration, capacity for punctuality; 11, 
Tune, the musical faculty; and 12, Language, or the 
power of verbal expression. To these are closely related 
the five external senses—Feeling, Seeing, Hearing, Taste, 
and Smell. 
Deficiency in any one of these faculties is not desirable 
—in some it is a sad misfortune. Few people who have 
not given the subject special attention are aware how 
many persons are congenitally deficient in one or more 
of these powers. Many children in our schools experience 
immense difficulty (often quite unappreciated by either 
teachers or parents) in learning at the outset to distin- 
guish and remember the different letters of the alphabet, 
and afterwards to spell words correctly, and to call them 
at sight—all resulting from a deficiency in the faculties 
termed Individuality and Form.. Thousands have suffered 
the tortures of the birch and the foolscap from this cause 
alone; and unless the deficiency has been remedied in PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
55 
youth, (as it is little likely to he by such measures,) what 
greater tortures have they suffered in after-life from ina- 
bility to remember persons and faces, to detect counter- 
feits, and to spell correctly even the commonest words of 
their native tongue. Many, too, are born deficient in 
power to judge of size, weight, color, or some other of 
the faculties named, incapacitating them to a greater or 
less extent for success in the practical duties and compe- 
titions of life. Recent test-examinations have proved 
that a considerable percentage of railroad employees are 
color-blind, thus unfitting them to observe danger-signals 
and exposing the traveling public to accidents and 
frightful disasters, unless such employees are removed. 
The same deficiency has been found among children 
in public schools. Were all mothers to take care to 
systematically cultivate and exercise this and all other 
faculties during gestation, instead of leaving the whole 
thing to chance as is usually done, such deficiencies would 
doubtless disappear. 
Exercises for the culture of the Observing and Percep- 
tive faculties, it is suggested, may properly commence 
about the third month; and it is repeated that special 
attention should be given to those which are lacking, or 
which are least inclined to spontaneous exercise, in the 
mother, or in both parents. 
Aids in the systematic culture of these faculties may 
doubtless be obtained from modern elementary works on 
Object Teaching for primary schools and kindergartens.* 
The defects of such works, or perhaps their entire absence, 
may be readily supplied by intelligent mothers, when 
they once understand the thing to be done, and its im- 
portance. 
* Calkins’ “New Primary Object-Lessons” (New York: Harper & Bro.’s) 
contains systematic exercises for developing the five senses and most of the 
perceptive faculties. 56 
PllB-NATAL CULTURE. 
Fourth Stage —The next group of faculties, in order of 
location in the brain according to phrenologists, and ap- 
parently aioo m order of normal development in.life, em- 
braces what have been termed the Constructive and 
Beautifying powers, sometimes designated as the Semi- 
Intellectual group. These in phrenological parlance are 
named: 1, Constructiveness, or ingenuity (the building 
and mechanical faculty;) 2, Ideality, love of the beauti- 
ful and refined (the poetical faculty;) 3, Sublimity, sense 
of the grand and sublime; 4, Mirthf ulness, or love of 
pleasantry, wit. Under the same general division may 
be classed, 5, Imitation, or the power to copy, represent, 
mimic; and 6, Suavity, or agreeableness, blandness. 
Closely associated with this group are also the lie a soil- 
ing and Reflective, and the Moral and Regulative, facul- 
ties, all of which may be classed together as the Directive 
and Regulative group. These include what are phreno- 
logically termed: 1, Causality, or power to apprehend 
first principles, to trace causes, etc.; 2, Comparison, or 
power to analyze, classify, and generalize ; 3, Human 
Nature, or sagacity in discernment of character; 4, 
Cautiousness, or prudence ; 5, Continuity, power of con- 
secutiveness or application ; 6, Approbativeness, regard for 
the good opinion of others, ambition ; 7, Self-Esteem, or 
self-respect; 8, Conscientiousness, love of right and ab- 
horrence of wrong ; and 9, Firmness, or perseverance. 
Nothing need be said, to any intelligent reader, as to 
the importance of each and every one of these faculties, 
in due exercise, to the formation of a well balanced Or 
perfect character; and the proper methods of their cul- 
ture, respectively, are to some extent suggested by the 
names given them. 
Special exercises for the development in the fetus of the 
brain-organs through which these faculties may manifest PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
57 
themselves, would seem to be in order after those adapted 
to the preceding group—say about from the fifth to the 
seventh month. 
Fifth Stage.—In the last and highest group of human 
faculties—last and highest whether considered with refer- 
ence to location in the cranium, or with reference to their 
value in human character, or the period at which they 
ordinarily arrive at maturity in the individual and in the 
race—we find what may be classed as the Humanitarian or 
Beneficent, the Religious or Worshipful, and the Aspira- 
tional, Spiritual, or Upward-Looking powers. These are 
phrenologically designated as : 1, Benevolence, philan- 
thropy, or universal love; 2, Veneration, reverence or 
worship; 3, Hope, or cheerful expectancy; 4, Spirituality, 
aspiration, prescience, faith, or power to apprehend spiritual 
realities and to lay hold on unseen verities. (This last has 
been sometimes termed “ Marvelousness,” and considered 
as synonymous with credulity, superstition, etc.; but these 
words apply more properly to the unreasoning over-action 
than to the normal exercise of this faculty.) 
These constitute, indeed, the crowning attributes of 
human nature. Ro character can be regarded as com- 
plete and symmetrical in which they are not in full and 
harmonious exercise. If any of this group, as of the pre- 
ceding, are deficient in either parent, the expectant mother 
cannot discharge her full duty to the unborn unless she 
make earnest efforts to supply the deficiency by self-cul- 
ture before its birth. The definitions of the several fac- 
ulties as given above will suggest tlie nature of the 
exercises by which such culture may be attained. 
While the faculties of this group should unquestionably 
be at all times kept in full exercise for the parents’ highest 
good, yet their special culture may well occupy attention 
during the final weeks of the gestatory period—say from 
the seventh to the ninth month, inclusive. 58 
PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
REMARKS. 
This plan suggestive only.—It will be noticed that the 
methods of culture and the course of proceeding indicated 
in the foregoing pages are suggestive only. The author 
knows of no instance in which any such methodical 
course has been pursued, and therefore can bring no tes- 
timony as to its value from actual trial. The recommen- 
dations submitted seem to be reasonably deducible from 
known facts and principles, and to point the way to im- 
portant desired results. Those to whom they apply, and 
who think them worthy of regard, are invited to put them 
to the test, and in due time to report the results. In this 
way valuable experience will be gained, and at some 
future day the world may be put in possession of facts for 
its safe and intelligent guidance in this most important 
matter. 
Naturalness of the plan.—Though the idea of a method- 
ical course of embryo-culture, as herein outlined, may seem 
novel to many readers, yet it is believed (as remarked to 
the author by a very intelligent and experienced mother, 
on hearing it read) it will be found to coincide in a general 
way with the usual natural promptings or intuitions of 
thoughtful mothers. It is common for them, in the earlier 
stages of pregnancy, to desire travel, exhilarating exer- 
cise, visiting among relatives and friends, with a rekind- 
ling of the tires of affection. And then, at a later 
period, there is usually a special and loving exercise of 
the constructive and beautifying faculties, in the efforts 
to provide a fitting wardrobe for the anticipated new- 
comer, and this is naturally attended and followed by 
more or less quickening and exaltation of the intellectual 
powers; while, as the longed-for, yet often dreaded, crisis 
approaches, it is common and natural that the thoughts 
should turn more prominently upon spiritual things, with PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
59 
a looking upward to Higher Powers for the strength and 
support that are needed in the trying hour. 
The Threnological Theory not essential.—Though the 
nomenclature and to some extent the classification 
adopted by Phrenologists has been used in the foregoing 
outline, (chiefly for the reason that nothing better seems 
for the present available,) yet it should be noted that an 
acceptance of the Phrenological system as a whole is not 
essential to this plan. There are difficulties in the way 
of modern Phrenology, as usually taught, which debar 
many intelligent people from its acceptance in detail. 
That the brain is in some general way the organ of the 
mind is, however, generally conceded. 
The important question is, Are the several faculties 
and instincts enumerated in the foregoing plan of culture, 
actually manifested in the normal and healthy action of 
the human being ? If so, they should each and all be 
appropriately cultivated in parents and transmitted to 
offspring in due degree. If any have been named that 
can be shown not to exist, or to be abnormal and unde- 
sirable in a human being, then let such be passed by. 
And if others not included in any of these groups can be 
ascertained to belong to perfected human nature, then let 
all such receive due attention. The only object is that 
the highest and most perfect type of humanity may be 
secured to those who through our instrumentality may 
come after us. 
Things to be avoided.—The prospective mother, in her 
efforts to improve herself and to worthily endow her off- 
spring, should by all means avoid anxiety, over-careful- 
ness, oppressive fear of mistake, and a painful sense of 
duty. These feelings would tend to enstamp upon the 
coming one an over-anxious, foreboding, painfully-care- 
ful disposition, than which hardly a greater evil can be 60 
PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
entailed. On the contrary, everything should be done 
with a cheerful delight, because its purpose is to confer 
blessings on an object of the tenderest affection, and it 
should be done with a joyful confidence as to the result. 
No greater blessing can be conferred than that of a 
cheerful, hopeful, helpful disposition, that delights in be- 
stowing good upon others, and that meets all the vicissi- 
tudes of life with a calm trustfulness. And there can be 
no doubt that such characteristics are determined in a 
large degree by the mother’s state during gestation. 
It hardly seems necessary in this connection to advert 
to the importance of avoiding all exercise of malevolent 
feelings, such as anger, envy, jealousy, hatred, revenge, 
covetousness, or wrong desire of any nature, since all 
readers of the foregoing pages must understand the dan- 
ger that such emotions, if indulged, may implant in the 
embryo the subtle germs from which will grow in after 
years the bitterest fruits. Of course, no serious reader 
of this work can be supposed to tolerate for a moment 
the thought of destroying an embryo, and hence no 
warning need here be given against that fearful crime, 
(i. e. an attempt at abortion,) the prevalence of which is 
filling our land with murderers, made such by their 
mothers before they are born. 
Surely too great care cannot be exercised to avoid the 
possibility of entailing any such evil tendencies upon off- 
spring. Persons of either sex, intending to become par- 
ents (and none, of course, should become parents without 
intending it,) in whom proclivities in such directions re- 
main unsubdued, would do well to pause and consider 
whether a work of regeneration in themselves ought not 
to precede generation. But enough has already been said 
on this point. 
Another thing important to be avoided, as far as prac- PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
61 
ticable, by the mother, is the presence of disagreeable and 
unprofitable associates of either sex. The untoward men- 
tal and moral influence that may be excited through the 
mother upon the forming child, by the frivolous and un- 
seemly conversation of persons unappreciative of the 
nobility and grandeur of the work which occupies her— 
the effect of coarse, indelicate speeches and the like—can 
be readily understood. But beyond this, there may be 
persons whose atmospheres are repugnant, and from whom 
the matron feels an instinctive shrinking. On no account 
should she allow herself, or be permitted by others, to be 
tortured by the presence of such repulsive individuals, 
whether as companions or domestics. There is reason to 
believe that the disagreeable characteristics of such re- 
pugnant persons are sometimes, by an occult law of 
transfer, enstamped upon offspring. At all events, their 
influence cannot be otherwise than detrimental to the 
best development of the embryo. 
THE FATHER’S SHARE IN THE WORK. 
In this work of Pre-Natal Culture, it scarcely need be 
said the father should take equal interest with the 
mother; for he is equally concerned in the object in view, 
namely, the production of noble and worthy offspring. 
Having given due attention to his own antecedent prep- 
arations, (see “The Better Way,” section on personal 
preparations,) he may perform essential service in the 
proper development of the embryo before birth. lie 
can accompany and assist the mother, to some extent at 
least, in the various exercises appropriate to the successive 
stages of its unfolding, providing the proper facilities 
therefor, (such as means for physical exercise and travel, 
books, pictures, models, &c.,) so far as practicable, and 
he can lend his sympathy and encouragement at every 62 
PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
step, guarding her against all untoward conditions or 
influences, and thus helping to secure such a result as will 
be a source of mutual joy forever. 
If, on the contrary, he manifests indifference, neglect, 
or untoward conduct of any kind, he may thwart and 
defeat the best efforts the mother can put forth, and may 
excite in her such feelings of depression, disappointment, 
grief, perhaps of repining, aversion, or disgust, as shall 
enstamp upon the child she is bearing characteristics 
which will prove a life-long burden or a curse. Many a 
child has been impressed before its birth with repugnance 
and dread toward its father, caused by his selfish or harsh 
treatment of the mother during this critical period, which 
can never be fully overcome in after life. Such a child 
is robbed of its birthright in paternal affection, and such 
a father robs himself of the bliss of filial love and confi. 
dence. The mother of one of the most quarrelsome, un- 
governable, and unhappy families of children the writer 
ever knew, stated to him that she never had the sympathy 
of the father during pregnancy in a single instance, but 
only his anger and dissatisfaction at her condition. A 
terrible penalty was that which this unhappy man drew 
upon himself, and a terrible curse did he inflict upon his 
offspring. 
CONFERRING SPECIAL TENDENCIES—GENIUS. 
In addition to the traits of a well-balanced character, 
it is doubtless desirable that parents should implant in 
each child a tendency to and aptitude for some special 
occupation or form of usefulness. Such an inborn ten- 
dency and aptitude greatly enhances the probabilities of 
success in any pursuit that may he followed in life; and 
the want of it often results in failure, poverty, vagabond- 
ism, and crime. Of course, the occupation or profession PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
63 
selected should be an honorable and useful one, and any 
occupation which is useful is honorable. 
When a congenital tendency or capacity is so marked 
as to confer extraordinary abilities for achievement in any 
line, it is termed Genius. It is thus undoubtedly within the 
power of parents, who will acquaint themselves with the 
law, and comply with its requirements, to confer even the 
coveted gifts of genius upon each and all of their offspring. 
Genius is not a thing of mere caprice, a freak of nature, 
or a gift of the gods, as has been supposed, but is no 
doubt as really the result of favoring ante-natal conditions 
(often unnoted) and as amenable to law, as is the produc- 
tion of a rarely superb flower or a specially delicious fruit 
under the hands of a skillful gardener. Its gifts are the 
exclusive heritage of no family, class, or position in life. 
The poor and humble may secure them for their children 
as readily as the wealthy and aristocratic, if they but learn 
and comply with the conditions. Is not this something 
worth knowing and living for ? How incomparably more 
valuable are the qualities of genius than is material 
wealth ? In fact, genius, rightly directed and properly 
combined, can command the wealth of the world. Yet 
how many parents so assiduously devote their energies of 
both body and mind during their best years to “ making 
money,” in order, perhaps, that they may give their 
children “ a start in life,” that little of either physical or 
mental force remains to be imparted to these children. 
Consequently they become physical weaklings or mental 
incompetents. And the thought of endowing their off- 
spring with the priceless treasures of immortal genius 
never once occurs to these parents. 
But how may special tendencies and aptitudes be im- 
parted ? The facts and suggestions already submitted 
clearly indicate the methods. Let the parents, during the 64 
PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
ten or twelve months antecedent to the birth of a child, 
interest themselves in, and prominently but cheerfully 
devote their minds to, the occupation, profession, or de- 
partment of human interest to which they wish to destine 
the child. If they cannot practically engage in the chosen 
occupation, they may yet think, talk, read, and study 
about it, and perhaps take opportunities to witness the 
labors of others who are engaged in it, and thus become 
conversant with its details. This, if done with pleasure 
and delight, can hardly fail of producing the desired re- 
sult. In addition to all this is the power of aspiration. 
Let the mother cherish strong aspirations, breathed in 
earnest prayers, that her child may be what she desires. 
The psychological influence of such aspirations, at such a 
time, cannot reasonably be questioned. Iso doubt, in the 
condition of receptivity or impressibility resultant from 
yearning aspiration or some other adequate cause, in one 
or both parents, at the time of inception or subsequently, 
is to be found the explanation of many cases of the occa- 
sional endowment of offspring with qualities far superior 
to what either parent has possessed. These seeming 
“ freaks of nature ” which have so puzzled students of 
heredity, would doubtless be found in strict accordance 
with law, were all the facts known. 
If a mother’s choice as to the calling she would have 
her child pursue has been wisely made—if the character 
desired be a truly noble one, however common or hum- 
ble—she may well make its attainment a subject of 
earnest prayer, which is but another word for aspiration. 
And in this connection let the reader recur to the case of 
the Quaker matron, whose daughter became a preacher, 
as narrated in a previous section, with the comments 
thereon. In that case is disclosed a further source of aid 
in giving a desirable bent to the tendencies of offspring, 
which if real is of momentous import to every mother. PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
65 
The mother of the first Napoleon, it is said, during the 
months preceding his birth, accompanied her husband 
upon a military campaign, and deeply interested herself 
in strategy and the arts of war. She thus conferred upon 
her child a genius for human destruction, before which all 
Europe trembled for many years. How much nobler, 
through the operation of the same law, to impart a genius 
for human improvement, which shall cause earth and 
heaven to rejoice through all coming time. 
While the means above indicated may be worthily 
employed to impart a special aptitude for some chosen 
line of usefulness, yet the plan of general culture before 
recommended should not be neglected—since there is no 
faculty or propensity normal to the human being but is 
needed in due and harmonious exercise, as much by the 
child of genius as by less gifted mortals. Genius with- 
out morals is a dangerous possession. 
It may be thought important, by some, that if parents 
undertake to pre-determine the aptitudes of their children 
for special occupations in life, they should also be able to 
pre-determine their sex, since certain occupations are 
deemed unsuitable for females, and others for males. 
In reference to this, the writer has only to say that 
while it is probable, as Agassiz has declared with regard 
to domestic animals, that the determination of sex may 
ere long be in the hands of intelligent persons, yet he is 
not satisfied that the present state of physiological science 
affords any certain means of control in this matter. Dif- 
ferent physiologists have suggested diverse theories and 
plans relating thereto, but, as far as the writer can 
learn, all are attended with uncertainty. While this 
is the case, may we not pertinently ask, what valid ob- 
jection is there to a person of either sex following any 
honorable pursuit, or performing any worthy function 66 
PRE-NATAL CULTURE. 
for humanity, for which he or she has a genius or a 
special fitness? The possession of such fitness for any 
department of service presupposes an ability to perform 
it well. And what matters the sex of the performer, so 
that humanity is well served ? It would be difficult to 
name any honorable function in the whole range of hu- 
man needs and capabilities but has been worthily filled 
and honored by persons of both sexes. True genius will 
command respect, and justify itself, whichever garb of 
sex it may wear. 
TIMES AND SEASONS. 
In so important an undertaking as the initiation of an 
immortal being, doubtless it is well to have due regard to 
times and seasons. Though the matter is one of much 
delicacy, yet our treatise would be incomplete without 
some reference to it. In the animal kingdom we ob- 
serve that, as a general rule, instinct leads to the bring- 
ing forth of young in the spring-time, or in early sum- 
mer. That seems to be Nature’s chosen and orderly 
time for the ushering in of new life in all departments... 
Probably human beings may well give heed to an inti- 
mation so broadly given, unless, indeed, the interior lead- 
ings of the intending mother clearly guide her otherwise. 
Following Nature’s lead in this matter, the periods de- 
voted to special exercises successively for physical, men- 
tal and moral culture, for the benefit of the embryo, as 
suggested in preceding pages, will fall into those seasons 
of the year which are ordinarily best adapted for the re- 
spective purposes—as Summer and Autumn for travel 
and out-of-door exercises, and Winter for mental and 
moral improvement. 
But doubtless in all such matters, the clear spiritual 
intuitions of the intending mother, when she seeks to be 
“led by the spirit,” are the most authoritative guide. 67 
PRE-NATAL CULTURE, 
CONCLUSION. 
To what grander achievement can either woman or 
man aspire than to be an artist in that noblest of arts, the 
moulding and reai’ing of immortal beings ? Fadeless 
renown has crowned the efforts of gifted sculptors and 
limners in the past to portray the perfect ideal of the 
‘‘human form divine/’ That field of High Art is open 
to comparatively few competitors—those fortunately en- 
dowed with rare genius. But here is a field of Higher 
Art, worthy of still greater honor—as much greater as 
the living perfect Man is better than a senseless image. 
And this field is open to almost every one, even the hum- 
blest, through the means set forth in the foregoing trea- 
tise. Yes! the Godlike privilege is brought within the 
reach of the great mass of those now entering the prime 
of manhood and womanhood, as well as of those who 
have not yet passed its noon-time, of endowing with the 
noble gifts of genius their own sons and daughters, however 
lowly born. 
Young men and woman of America—fathers and 
mothers of the future race—will you not accept this high 
privilege, and prove yourselves worthy of it ? 
THE END.