Pain in childbirth

I recently read a piece from a book written by J. Hausinger and published in 1801. It made quite clear to me how children were taught in those times and how the belief of a lot of pain and misery came to be.

Below I will quote.

Boy: Where do children come from, dear tutor?
Tutor: They grow in their mother's body. When they have gotten so large that there is no more room for them, the mother must push them out, something like what we do when we have eaten a lot and then go to the privy. But it hurts the mother very much.
Boy: And then the baby is born?
Tutor: Yes.
Boy: But how does the baby get into the mother's body?
Tutor: That we don't know; we only know that it grows there.
Boy: That's very strange.
Tutor: No, not at all.--Look at that whole forest that has grown over there. No one is surprised by this because everyone knows that trees grow out of the earth. In the same way, no reasonable person is surprised that a baby grows in its mother's body. For this has been so as long as people have been on earth.
Boy: And do midwives have to be there when a baby is born?
Tutor: Yes, because the mothers are in such pain that they can't take care of themselves all alone. Since not all women are so hardhearted and fearless that they can be around people who must undergo so much pain, there are women in every town who are paid to stay with the mothers until the pain has passed. They are like the women who prepare dead bodies for burial; washing the dead or undressing and dressing them are also tasks not to everyone's liking which people therefore perform for money.
Boy: I would like to be there sometime when a baby is born.
Tutor: If you want an idea of the pain and distress mothers experience, you don't need to go and see a baby being born; one doesn't have that chance because mothers do not know themselves at what moment the pains will begin. Instead, I will take you to Dr. R. when he is about to amputate a patient's leg or remove a stone from someone's body. Those people wail and scream just like mothers giving birth.....
Boy: My mother told me not long ago that the midwife can tell right away whether the baby is a boy or a girl. How does the midwife know?
Tutor: I will tell you. Boys are much more broad-shouldered and large-boned than girls; but primarily, boys' hands and feet are always broader and coarser than girls' hands and feet. For example, you need only look at the hand of your sister, who is nearly a year and a half older than you; your hand is much broader than hrs, and your fingers are thicker and fleshier. That makes them look shorter too, although they are not.

This "knowledge" must be quite frightening to little boys and girls.
The way people were messing with childrens' minds is frightening to me. Its such an insult to childrens' intelligence. And of course this makes it possible to manipulate.
Very sad how children were treated.
And no wonder people were frightened of birth and no wonder women were having lots of pain in childbirth, they were made to believe it was that way and no other way. Very very sad.