James I of Scotland:
“James was an early opponent of painless childbirth. … one of the King’s subjects, a gentlewoman named Eufame MacAlyane, was suffering unbearable pain during the birth of her twin sons. In desperation, she sought pain-relief from Agnes Sampson, reportedly a witch. MacAlyane thereby violated God’s command in Gen. 3:16: “Unto the woman he said, I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception; in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children; and thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee.”
“The King ordered her execution. Eufame MacAlyane was burned alive on Castle Hill, Edinburgh in 1591.”
By contrast: “Farther it is to be noted, that these words here of Gen. iii. 16 … import no more, but that subjection they should ordinarily be in to their husbands: but there is here no more law to oblige a woman to such subjection, if the circumstances either of her condition, or contract with her husband, should exempt her from it, than there is, that she should bring forth her children in sorrow and pain, if there could be found a remedy for it, which is also a part of the same curse upon her …. neither will any one, I suppose, by these words, think the weaker sex, as by law, so subjected to the curse contained in them, that it is their duty not to endeavour to avoid it. And will any one say, that Eve, or any other woman, sinned, if she were brought to bed without those multiplied pains God threatens her here with?” – John Locke, First Treatise V.47