Page:The Feminist Movement - Snowden - 1912.djvu/212

 No person who thinks at all can fail to be touched by any plea from labour for an improvement in its condition. When it is realised that the wealthiest country in the world pays over two millions of its male workers less than 25s. a week, that twelve millions of the working classes do not get enough of the ordinary necessaries of life to maintain a decently comfortable existence, that more than one-fourth of the working people of the country live in houses that do not conform to the requirements of the law in matters pertaining to sanitation and the provision of air-space, and that six millions of infants have died during the last fifty years, most of whom should have been living men and women to-day, it is quite impossible to be averse from doing anything or supporting any cause which would make the hard lot and heavy burden of the toilers harder and heavier to bear. The question of the labour of women cannot be considered apart from a number of grave considerations bearing upon the welfare of the race; but its consideration involves the recognition at the outset of the following hard facts.

The destiny of the normal woman is undoubtedly marriage and motherhood. This, under any form of government and in any system of society, is the life that the normal woman will choose. It is amazing folly to