464 SCIENCE PROGRESS 



this way, will show how short is the time during which a 

 succession in the male line is maintained. On the other hand, 

 even in the case of the aristocracy, all but the eldest son in each 

 generation are dependent upon the maintenance of a certain 

 standard of efficiency ; if unfavourable variations occur and 

 are handed on to the offspring, the individuals forming the 

 off-shoots — one should perhaps rather say the overwhelming 

 majority of the members — of these families must rapidly sink 

 to lower classes in the social scale. In the lowest class the 

 stringency of selection, particularly with regard to physical 

 characters, is very high, as is shown by the very high infant 

 mortality among other things. At the present time it is 

 probably far easier for individuals to rise from the lower 

 classes than was formerly the case and it is just as difficult 

 for individuals to remain in the higher classes and place 

 their children in positions similar to their own. 



It must of course be realised that man is the supremely edu- 

 cable animal but this fact has unfortunately so impressed some 

 people who write upon social problems, that the inheritance of 

 mental capacities as distinct from superadded education has been 

 completely overlooked by them. No two boys in the same 

 class in a school will show precisely the same ability in 

 acquiring knowledge or skill. Moreover, one boy will very 

 likely be brilliant in mathematics but hopeless in some other 

 subject ; whilst the boy who is good in this other subject may 

 be incapable of attaining to any great efficiency in mathematics. 

 Probably all the class will be capable of attaining to a certain 

 degree of efficiency in any subject but the labour involved in 

 such attainment will vary in every case and some of them will 

 be unable to get beyond a comparatively low standard. The 

 various mental capacities are undoubtedly transmissible from 

 parents to offspring with variations towards increase or 

 decrease. 



At the present time the selection of physical characters, 

 particularly among children, is most stringent in the lowest 

 class but it extends to all. In the case of all individuals there 

 is a continual competition by which the least efficient are 

 selected and placed under conditions under which the mor- 

 tality is highest. Of course, I do not for a moment contend 

 that there are no cases in which an individual, through an 

 unfortunate concatenation of circumstances, is kept in a position 



