Our child's mother was many times frightened severely as her sister-in-law was quite out of her mind."
It is easily understandable that any event which makes such an impression on the mother as to affect her health, might so disturb the normal functioning of her body that her child would be badly nourished, or even poisoned. Such facts undoubtedly form the basis on which the airy fabric of prenatal culture was reared by those who lived before the days of scientific biology.
Thus, it is easy enough to see the real explanation of such cases as those mentioned near the beginning of this discussion. The mothers who fret and rebel over their maternity, she found, are likely to bear neurotic children. It is obvious (1) that mothers who fret and rebel are quite likely themselves to be neurotic in constitution, and the child naturally gets its heredity from them: (2) that constant fretting and rebellion would so affect the mother's health that her child would not be properly nourished.
When, however, she goes on to draw the inference that "self-control, cheerfulness and love ... will practically insure you a child normal in physique and nerves," we are obliged to stop. We know that what she says is not true. If the child's heredity is bad, neither self-control, cheerfulness, love, nor anything else known to science, can make that heredity good.
At first thought, one may wish it were otherwise. There is something inspiring in the idea of a mother overcoming the effect of heredity by the sheer force of her own will-power. But perhaps in the long run it is as well; for there are advantages on the other side. It should be a satisfaction to mothers to know that their children will not be marked or injured by untoward events in the antenatal days; that if the child's heredity can not be changed for the better, neither can it be changed for