This is what "Race-Suicide" means, and we must face the fact squarely.
It can scarcely be said, however, that the meaning of "Race-Suicide" has actually been squarely faced by those who have most vehemently raised that cry.

Translated into more definite and precise terms this cry means, and is intended to mean: "We want more births." That is what it definitely means, and sometimes in the minds of those who make this demand it seems also to imply nothing more.

Yet it implies a great number of other things.
It implies certain strain and probable ill-health on the mothers, it implies distress and disorder in the family, it implies, even if the additional child survives, a more acute industrial struggle, and it further involves in this case, by the stimulus it gives to over-population, the perpetual menace of militarism and war.

What, however, even at the outset, more births most distinctly and most unquestionably imply is more deaths.

It is nowadays so well known that a high birth-rate is accompanied by a high death-rate--the exceptions are too few to need attention--that it is unnecessary to adduce further evidence.