A Solemn Appeal - Ellen G. White

intellect has become weakened, by so great a
draught upon her vital resources. Her offspring
suffer her debility, and thus a class is thrown upon
society, poorly fitted, through the mother’s
inability to educate them, to be of the least benefit.
If these mothers had given birth to but few
children, and if they had been careful to live upon
such food as would preserve physical health and
mental strength, so that the moral and intellectual
might predominate over the animal, they could
have so educated their children for usefulness, as to
have made them bright ornaments to society.
If parents in past generations had, with
firmness of purpose, kept the body servant to the
mind, and had not allowed the intellectual to be
enslaved by animal passions, there would be in this
age a different order of beings upon the earth. And
if the mother, before the birth of her offspring, had
always possessed self-control, realizing that she
was giving the stamp of character to future
generations, the present state of society would not
be so depreciated in character as at the present
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