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“Yes,” asserted the publisher, smoothing out the P. Ts.; “the old unreasoned instinct and repugnance will be put on a true basis when it is seen that childlessness is a proof of unworthiness–a brand of failure.”

“As old-maidenhood is, less justly, to-day,” I put in.

“Quite so,” said Marindin eagerly. “In their anxiety to be worthy of selection by Posterity, parents will rise to heights of health and holiness of which our sick generation does not dream. If they do not, woe to them! They will be remorselessly left to die out without issue.

“The change has begun; our sect is spreading fast. In the course of a century or two physical and mental deformities will vanish from the earth.” His eye flashed prophetic fire.

“So soon?” I said, with a sceptical smile.

“How could they survive?” Marindin inquired scathingly.

“Is it likely any of us would consent to be born hunchbacks?” broke in the publisher; “or to enter families with hereditary gout? Would any sane Antelander put himself under the yoke of animal instincts or tendencies to drink? Ah, here is a bibulous grandfather!” and he tossed one of the P. Ts. disdainfully aside, though I observed that the old gentleman in question had been an English Earl.

“But, Mr. Fore,” I protested, “will all the unborn attach such importance to the pathological pedigree as you do? What power will make them train up their parents in the way they should go?”

“The greatest power on earth,” broke in Marindin; “the power of selfishness, backed by education. Enlightened selfishness is all that is needed to bring about the millennium. The selfishness of to-day is so stupid. Let the unborn care only for their own skins, and they will improve the parents, and be well brought up themselves by the good parents they have selected.”

“But come now, Mr. Fore,” I said; “the new system has been partially at work, I understand, for some time. Do you assure me, on your word of honor as an unborn publisher, that the filial franchise has been invariably exercised wisely and well?”

“Of course not,” interrupted Marindin. “Haven’t I already told you there has been much fumbling and experimentation, some souls being born for money and some for beauty and some for position? But pioneers must always suffer–for the benefit of those who come after.”

“Certainly there have been rash and improvident births,” admitted the publisher. “Hasty births, premature births, secret births, morganatic births, illegitimate births, and every variety of infelicitous intrusion upon your planet. The rash are born too early, the cautious too late; some even repent on the very brink of birth and elect to be stillborn. But in the majority of cases birth is the outcome of mature deliberation; a contract entered into with a full sense of the responsibilities of the situation.”

“But what do you understand by illegitimate birth?” I asked.

“The selection of parents not possessing the P. C. There are always eccentric spirits who would defy the dearest and most sacred institutions organised by society for its own protection. We are gradually creating a public opinion to discountenance such breaches of the law, and such perils to the commonweal, subversive as they are of all our efforts to promote the general happiness and holiness. Even in your uncivilised communities,” continued the publisher, “these unlicensed and illegitimate immigrants are stamped with life-long opprobrium and subjected to degrading disabilities; how much infamy should then attach to them when the sin they are born in is their own!”

“A lesser degree of illegitimacy,” added Marindin, “is to be born into a family already containing the full number it is licensed for. This happens particularly in rich families, introductions into which are naturally most sought after. It is still a moot point whether the birth should be legitimatised on the death of one of the other children.”

“But it is the indirect results that I look forward to most,” he went on after a pause. “For example, the solution of Nihilism in Russia.”