“Both parents transmit their own characteristics, mental and physical, their dispositions and appetites, to their children. As the result of parental intemperance children often lack physical strength and mental and moral power… And as the children have less power to resist temptation than had the parents, the tendency is for each generation to fall lower and lower.

To a great degree parents are responsible not only for the violent passions and perverted appetites of their children but for the infirmities… The inquiry of every father and mother should be, “What shall we do unto the child that shall be born unto us?” The effect of prenatal influences has been by many lightly regarded… And it was not enough that the promised child should receive a good legacy from the parents. This must be followed by careful training and the formation of right habits.”

Patriarchs and Prophets p.561
by Ellen G. White