Russell places most of the blame for this on social causes that are
outside the scope of this book:
1. Becoming a housewife and mother is a decline
in status and an increase in drudgery for the modern professional woman.
"In relation to her children, the sacrifices that she has made in order
to have them are so present to her mind that she is almost sure to demand
more reward than it is reasonable to expect, while the constant habit of
attending to trivial details will have made her fussy and small-minded.
This is the most pernicious of all the injustices that she has to suffer:
that in consequence of doing her duty by her family she has lost their
affection." [page 148]
2. Urbanization has led to a situation in which
either children are raised with very little space, or long suburban commutes
remove the father from the family.
A greatness of soul comes through identification with biological descendants. "To be happy in this world, especially when youth is past, it is necessary to feel oneself not merely an isolated individual whose day will soon be over, but part of the stream of life flowing on from the first germ to the remote and unknown future. ... Those who have allowed their procreative impulses to become atrophied have separated themselves from the stream of life and in so doing have run a grave risk of becoming desiccated. For them, unless they are exceptionally impersonal, death ends all. The world that shall come after them does not concern them, and because of this their doings appear to themselves trivial and unimportant." [pages 153-154] See Theme C for a larger discussion of greatness of soul.
Concerning the personal (as opposed to social) aspects of parenthood, the issues center around the proper use of power. "From a very early age there comes to be a conflict between love of parental power and desire for the child's good, for, while power over the child is to a certain extent decreed by the nature of things, it is nevertheless desirable that the child should as soon as possible learn to be independent in as many ways as possible, which is unpleasant to the power impulse of a parent. ... In a thousand ways, great and small, the possessive impulse of parents will lead them astray unless they are very watchful or very pure in heart." [pages 156-157] "The parent who genuinely desires his child's welfare more than his or her power over the child will, if sufficiently intelligent, not need textbooks on psychoanalysis to say what should and what should not be done, but will be guided aright by impulse. ... The full joy of parenthood is only to be obtained by those who can deeply feel this attitude of respect towards the child." [pages 157-158]
"We all feel pleasure when we are admired for our merits, but most of us are sufficiently modest at heart to feel that such admiration is precarious. Our parents love us because we are their children and this is an unalterable fact, so that we feel more safe with them than with any one else. In times of success this may seem unimportant, but in times of failure it affords a consolation and a security not to be found elsewhere." [page 155] It's worth remembering here that Russell experienced the parent-child relationship mainly as a parent -- his own parents having died in his toddlerhood. I suspect this is a projection of how he thinks children ought to feel, rather than the memory of a feeling he has experienced personally.