312 MEMORIES OF MY LIFE 



Confusion is often made between statistical and 

 individual results. It sometimes seems to be held 

 seriously that if the effect of a particular union cannot 

 be accurately foretold, the application of the rules of 

 Eugenics is vain. This is not the case. Statistics 

 give us assurance concerning the fate of such or such 

 a percentage of a large number of people which, when 

 translated into other terms, is the probability of each 

 of them being affected by it. From the statesman's 

 point of view, where lives are pawns in the game and 

 personal favour is excluded, this information is suffi- 

 cient. It tells how large a number of undesirables 

 or of desirables can be introduced or not into a 

 population by such and such measures. Whether 

 their names be A, B, or C, or else X, Y, or Z, 

 is of no importance to the "Statistician," a term 

 that is more or less equivalent to that of " States- 

 man." 



In accordance with one principal purpose of these 

 pages, which is to show the fundamental coherence 

 of most of my many inquiries, I will quote several 

 passages from the above-mentioned articles written 

 in 1865. They expressed then, as clearly as I can 

 do now, the leading principles of Eugenics. They 

 will each be followed by a remark as to how I should 

 wish to modify them. 



" The power of man over animal life, in producing 

 whatever varieties of form he pleases, is enormously 

 great. It would seem as though the physical structure 

 of future generations was almost as plastic as clay, 

 under the control of the breeder's will. It is my 

 desire to show, more pointedly than, so far as I 



