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102 PROBLEMS CONFRONTING RUSSIA
to accept all responsibility towards the future generation
lies at the bottom of the growth and decay of the many
civilisations which have followed one after the other. Be
it the Indian civilisation of the Vedic period, the Summerian,
Armenian, Persian, or Egyptian epochs of splendour and
development, or classical Greece and Rome, the chief reason
of the decadence and downfall of each and all is
unquestionably the fact that overcivilised nations die out because
their women cease to bring forth children, partly avoiding
child-bearing for the sake of personal comfort and economy,
and partly losing the very faculty of conception by the
overindulgence of intellectual development detracting them
from the interests of family life.
It is a well-known fact that the higher education of women
has an adverse influence on the procreation of children.
The birth-rate of the working classes is 30 per cent, greater
than that of the intellectually trained, and it is not without
significance that in countries which enjoy woman’s suffrage,
like Finland and Australia, the birth-rate is lower than in
other countries, and that in America and in France, where
the women are more highly cultured and take a more active
part in public affairs than in Great Britain and in Germany,
the birth-rate is prominently on the decline. Russia, the
land of the peasant woman, living a life of devotion to home
and family, is an example of undiminished racial vitality.
The birth-rate in Russia is 46-8 and the death-rate 29*8
per 1000, while in Great Britain the birth-rate is only 23-9
and the death-rate 14"2 ; in France even less : 187, and
the death-rate 19 6 ; in Germany the birth-rate is 29’8
and the death-rate i6-2. While the birth-rate in Western
Europe is alarmingly declining, Russia augments her
population of 180 million inhabitants by nearly 3 million souls
per annum. According to this ratio the Russian population
will in the year 2000 exceed 500 million souls. This
calculation is not only theoretically but also practically sound,
as Russia has actually sufficient room for keeping that
number of inhabitants. By empirical law it has been
ascertained that emigration is imposed when there are not
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