Medical science and practice at the present day—­although it can scarcely be said that it speaks with an absolutely unanimous voice—­on the whole occupies a position midway between that of the classic lawyers and that of the later Christian ecclesiastics.  It is, on the whole, in favor of sacrificing the foetus whenever the interests of the mother demand such a sacrifice.  General medical opinion is not, however, prepared at present to go further, and is distinctly disinclined to aid the parents in exerting an unqualified control over the foetus in the womb, nor is it yet disposed to practice abortion on eugenic grounds.  It is obvious, indeed, that medicine cannot in this matter take the initiative, for it is the primary duty of medicine to save life.  Society itself must assume the responsibility of protecting the race.

Dr. S. Macvie ("Mother versus Child,” Transactions Edinburgh Obstetrical Society, vol. xxiv, 1899) elaborately discusses the respective values of the foetus and the adult on the basis of life-expectancy, and concludes that the foetus is merely “a parasite performing no function whatever,” and that “unless the life-expectancy of the child covers the years in which its potentiality is converted into actuality, the relative values of the maternal and foetal life will be that of actual as against potential.”  This statement seems fairly sound.  Ballantyne (Manual of Antenatal Pathology:  The Foetus, p. 459) endeavors to make the statement more precise by saying that “the mother’s life has a value, because she is what she is, while the foetus only has a possible value, on account of what it may become.”

Durlacher, among others, has discussed, in careful and cautious detail, the various conditions in which the physician should, or should not, induce abortion in the interests of the mother ("Der Kuenstliche Abort,” Wiener Klinik, Aug. and Sept., 1906); so also, Eugen Wilhelm ("Die Abtreibung und das Recht des Arztes zur Vernichtung der Leibesfrucht,” Sexual-Probleme, May and June, 1909).  Wilhelm further discusses whether it is desirable to alter the laws in order to give the physician greater freedom in deciding on abortion.  He concludes that this is not necessary, and might even act injuriously, by unduly hampering medical freedom.  Any change in the law should merely be, he considers, in the direction of asserting that the destruction of the foetus is not abortion in the legal sense, provided it is indicated by the rules of medical science.  With reference to the timidity of some medical men in inducing abortion, Wilhelm remarks that, even in the present state of the law, the physician who conscientiously effects abortion, in accordance with his best knowledge, even if mistakenly, may consider himself safe from all legal penalties, and that he is much more likely to come in conflict with the law if it can be proved that death followed as a result of his