FAMILY LIFE
[To the Editor of the SPECTATOR.]
Sm,—Readers of the Spectator have to thank you for the brilliant article in last week's issue by Rose Ma-caulay on what she describes as " this monstrous wen on the face of. civilization called family life."
The mass of evidence which she brings forward against this institution is formidable. It rangei from the Garden of Eden and Olympus through Hebrew, Greek and Roman history to Shakespeare.
This evidence at first sight seems overwhelming. PerhapS there may be something to say on the other side, were it only the assertion of George Eliot that the Alniighty'g intention in making families was that the members of them might be as rude to each other as they liked without its mattering— surely a great boon, and a privilege which members.of families exercise cheerfully. That the writer of the article shared this privilege we are not told ; but it is clear that the testimony of history and mythology have been too much for her optimism. Whereas earlier in the article she pleads for " a fuller, more patiently sympathetic enquiry into this great trouble. . . . For in, cure is possible without careful diagnosis of the symptoms of the disease," in her last sentence all hope of cure is gone. " Inscrutable and irresistible this family will pursue its wild and headlong course -Ilan the earth on which it functions runs itself down.", Poignant words. Probably no one has enjoyed Miss Macaulay's jeu cresprit more than herself.-1 am,
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