306 Sociological Application [CH. xvi 



have said, gives no clear sanction to these proposals. It 

 may also be doubted whether the guiding estimate of popular 

 sentiment is well-founded. Society has never shown itself 

 averse to adopt measures of the most stringent and even 

 brutal kind for the control of those whom it regards as its 

 enemies. 



Genetic knowledge must certainly lead to new concep- 

 tions of justice, and it is by no means impossible that in 

 the light of such knowledge public opinion will welcome 

 measures likely to do more for the extinction of the criminal 

 and degenerate than has been accomplished by ages of penal 

 enactment. 



