the condition of a child before birth, slew a pregnant woman, committing thereby a double murder, that of the mother and of the child in her womb. Stung by remorse, the murderer fled to the desert, and passed the remainder of his life in constant penance and prayer. At last, after many years, the voice of God told him that he had been forgiven the murder of the woman. But yet his end was a clouded one. He never could obtain an assurance that he had been forgiven the death of the child.1

If we pass to the next stage of human life, that of the new-born infant, we find ourselves in presence of that practice of infanticide which was one of the deepest stains of the ancient civilisation. The natural history of this crime is somewhat peculiar.2 Among savages, whose feelings of compassion are very faint, and whose warlike and nomadic

ing the motives of the founder, in which the following sentences occur: Quia frequenter per luxuriam hominum genus decipitur, et exinde malum homicidii generatur, dum concipientes ex adulterio, ne prodantur in publico, fetos teneros necant, et absque baptismatis lavacro parvulos ad Tartara mittunt, quia nullum reperiunt locum, quo servare vivos valeant,' &c. Henry II. of France, 1556, made a long law against women who,' advenant le temps de leur part et délivrance de leur enfant, occultement s'en délivrent, puis le suffoquent et autrement suppriment sans leur avoir fait empartir le Saint Sacrement du Baptême.'-Labourt, Recherches sur les Enfans trouvés, p. 47. There is a story told of a Queen of Portugal (sister to Henry V. of England, and mother of St. Ferdinand) that, being in childbirth, her life was despaired of unless she took a medicine which would accelerate the birth but probably sacrifice the

life of the child. She answered that 'she would not purchase her temporal life by sacrificing the eternal salvation of her son.'Bollandists, Act. Sanctor., June 5th.

1 Tillemont, Mémoires pour servir à l'Histoire ecclésiastique (Paris, 1701), tome x. p. 41. St. Clem. Alexand. says that infants in the womb and exposed infants have guardian angels to watch over them. (Strom. v.)

There is an extremely large literature devoted to the subject of infanticide, exposition, foundlings, &c. The books I have chiefly followed are Terme et Monfalcon, Histoire des Enfans trouvés (Paris, 1840); Remacle, Des Hospices d'Enfans trouvés (1838); Labourt, Recherches historiques sur les Enfans trouvés (Paris, 1848); Konigswarter, Essai sur la Législation des Peuples anciens et modernes relative aux Enfans nés hors Mariage (Paris, 1842). There are also many details on the subject in Godefroy's

habits are eminently unfavourable to infant life, it is, as might be expected, the usual custom for the parent to decide whether he desires to preserve the child he has called into existence, and if he does not, to expose or slay it. In nations that have passed out of the stage of barbarism, but are still rude and simple in their habits, the practice of infanticide is usually rare; but, unlike other crimes of violence, it is not naturally diminished by the progress of civilisation, for, after the period of savage life is passed, its prevalence is influenced much more by the sensuality than by the barbarity of a people. We may trace too, in many countries and ages, the notion that children, as the fruit, representatives, and dearest possessions of their parents, are acceptable sacrifices to the gods.2 Infanticide, as is well known, was almost universally

Commentary to the laws about children in the Theodosian Code, in Malthus, On Population, in Edward's tract On the State of Slavery in the Early and Middle Ages of Christianity, and in most ecclesiastical histories.

1It must not, however, be inferred from this that infanticide increases in direct proportion to the unchastity of a nation. Probably the condition of civilised society in which it is most common, is where a large amount of actual unchastity coexists with very strong social condemnation of the sinner, and where, in consequence, there is an intense anxiety to conceal the fall. A recent writer on Spain has noticed the almost complete absence of infanticide in that country, and has ascribed it to the great leniency of public opinion towards female frailty. Foundling hospitals, also, greatly influence the history of infanticide; but the mortality in them was long so great that it may be questioned

whether they have diminished the number of the deaths, though they have, as I believe, greatly diminished the number of the murders of children. Lord Kames, writing in the last half of the eighteenth century, says: 'In Wales, even at present, and in the Highlands of Scotland, it is scarce a disgrace for a young woman to have a bastard. In the country last mentioned, the first instance known of a bastard child being destroyed by its mother through shame is a late one. The virtue of chastity appears to be thus gaining ground, as the only temptation a woman can have to destroy her child is to conceal her frailty.'-Sketches of the History of Man-On the Progress of the Female Sex. The last clause is clearly inaccurate, but there seems reason for believing that maternal affection is generally stronger than want, but weaker than shame.

2 See Warburton's Divine Legation, vii. 2.

admitted among the Greeks, being sanctioned, and in some cases enjoined, upon what we should now call 'the greatest happiness principle,' by the ideal legislations of Plato and Aristotle, and by the actual legislations of Lycurgus and Solon. Regarding the community as a whole, they clearly saw that it is in the highest degree for the interest of society that the increase of population should be very jealously restricted, and that the State should be as far as possible free from helpless and unproductive members; and they therefore concluded that the painless destruction of infant life, and especially of those infants who were so deformed or diseased that their lives, if prolonged, would probably have been a burden to themselves, was on the whole a benefit. The very sensual tone of Greek life rendered the modern notion of prolonged continence wholly alien to their thoughts; and the extremely low social and intellectual condition of Greek mothers, who exercised no appreciable influence over the habits of thought of the nation should also, I think, be taken into account, for it has always been observed that mothers are much more distinguished than fathers for their affection for infants that have not yet manifested the first dawning of reason. Even in Greece, however, infanticide and exposition were not universally permitted. In Thebes these offences are said to have been punished by death.1

The power of life and death, which in Rome was originally conceded to the father over his children, would appear to involve an unlimited permission of infanticide; but a very old law, popularly ascribed to Romulus, in this respect restricted the parental rights, enjoining the father to bring up

1 Ælian, Varia Hist. ii. 7. Passages from the Greek imaginative writers, representing exposition as the avowed and habitual practice of poor parents, are collected by Terme et Monfalcon, Hist. des Enfans trouvés, pp. 39-45. Tacitus

notices with praise (Germania, xix.) that the Germans did not allow infanticide. He also notices (Hist. v. 5) the prohibition of infanticide among the Jews, and ascribes it to their desire to increase the popula tion.

all his male children, and at least his eldest female child, forbidding him to destroy any well-formed child till it had completed its third year, when the affections of the parent might be supposed to be developed, but permitting the expcsition of deformed or maimed children with the consent of their five nearest relations. The Roman policy was always to encourage, while the Greek policy was rather to restrain, population, and infanticide never appears to have been common in Rome till the corrupt and sensual days of the Empire. The legislators then absolutely condemned it, and it was indirectly discouraged by laws which accorded special privileges to the fathers of many children, exempted poor parents from most of the burden of taxation, and in some degree provided for the security of exposed infants. Public opinion probably differed little from that of our own day as to the fact, though it differed from it much as to the degree, of its criminality. It was, as will be remembered, one of the charges most frequently brought against the Christians, and it was one that never failed to arouse popular indignation. Pagan and Christian authorities are, however, united in speaking of infanticide as a crying vice of the Empire, and Tertullian observed that no laws were more easily or more constantly evaded than those which condemned it.2 A broad distinction was popularly drawn between infanticide and exposition. The latter, though probably condemned, was certainly not punished by law; 3 it was practised on a

1 Dion. Halic. ii. 2 Ad Nat. i. 15.

The well-known jurisconsult Paulus had laid down the proposition, Necare videtur non tantum is qui partum perfocat sed et is qui abjicit et qui alimonia denegat et qui publicis locis misericordiæ causa exponit quam ipse non habet.' (Dig. lib. xxv. tit. iii. 1. 4.) These words have given rise to a famous

controversy between two Dutch
professors, named Noodt and Byn-
kershoek, conducted on both sides
with great learning, and on the
side of Noodt with great passion.
Noodt maintained that these words
are simply the expression of a
moral truth, not a judicial decision,
and that exposition was
illegal in Rome till some time after
the establishment of Christianity.

never

gigantic scale and with absolute impunity, noticed by writers with the most frigid indifference, and, at least in the case of destitute parents, considered a very venial offence. Often,

no doubt, the exposed children perished, but more frequently the very extent of the practice saved the lives of the victims. They were brought systematically to a column near the Velabrum, and there taken by speculators, who educated them as slaves, or very frequently as prostitutes.2