1474. But before we go directly on to the cosmic analysis of the sexual principle itself, we have still a problem to elucidate, namely, that of "contraception". We have already previously mentioned how, in addition to using "foeticide", a great many people have also tried to avoid conception by means of appropriate contraceptive measures. We saw that this tendency arose partly from the rapid growth of terrestrial mankind's erotic or sexual drive at the same time as the economic evolution of the ordinary terrestrial human being was quite unable to keep pace with the speed of this growth. This thus meant that a lot of people in reality could not "afford" to become or to be "parents". They therefore had to struggle with tremendous difficulties to procure food and clothing for their offspring or large family. Because sexual evolution progresses much faster than the economic evolution of the state, the state's understanding of and support for children or offspring was correspondingly spartan. Bringing children into the world thus became a rather risky phenomenon. That the most intelligent of society's beings therefore sought new ways to remedy this misery is naturally a matter of course. But when they could not remedy the misery by economic means, the idea of limiting the number of births by either "contraception" or "foeticide" became equally a matter of course. That "foeticide" and "contraception" for financial reasons are of course glaringly against the law of neighbourly love or a fundamental infringement of the fifth commandment, "Thou shalt not kill", and will therefore give rise to a corresponding karma is also a matter of course. These phenomena can therefore never be justified in any case whatsoever where they occur for purely economic reasons. Life itself will sooner or later inevitably hold both the state and the parents responsible. But this does not of course mean that there are not other situations in which these phenomena are carried out for entirely other reasons, indeed, for reasons that even come under the concept of "love" and can therefore be perceived as not merely morally permissible but even as a duty. And, today because of the terrestrial human being's natural sexual evolution, such situations are rather numerous.