HEREDITY 



The reader will note the avoidance of eugenic proposals 

 in what has been said regarding problems in the sociologi- 

 cal field. With the eugenic procedure suggested by Sir 

 Francis Galton in 1883 everyone must have the most 

 profound sympathy; for he defined his purpose as "the 

 study of agencies under social control that may improve 

 or impair the racial qualities of future generations, either 

 physically or mentally." Even the mediaeval mind of 

 G. K. Chesterton would have difficulty in discovering 

 the evil character of such an ideal. But one may also con- 

 fess to no wild enthusiasm for the small-knowing souls 

 who offer social salvation in impracticable programs 

 based on that vaguely conceived formula "the survival 

 of the fit." The creed itself is sound enough, since social 

 progress depends primarily upon the genetic constitution 

 of the people of which society is composed. The irritating 

 point in such schemes, apart from any question of feasibility, 

 is the emotionalism so evident in the average segregation 

 of the sheep from the goats. The fit would be for Bishop 

 Cannon the Dry, for Hilaire Belloc the Catholic, for Pat 

 Harrison the Democrat, for the Reverend Doctor Massee 

 the Fundamentalist; they might not be so fit for Mencken, 

 Joseph McCabe, Senator Vare, and Clarence Darrow. For 

 these reasons, one is justified in feeling, regarding eugenics, 

 much as did Charles Darwin when he wrote to Galton on 

 the subject in virtually these words: The object is a grand 

 one, and it is the sole feasible plan of improving the human 

 race; yet the difficulties which stand in the way of any 

 practical procedure are so great as to make it, I fear, 

 Utopian. 



Genetics should do more than furnish the factual founda- 

 tion for projects of direct racial improvement, even though 

 some such measures may be both sound and profitable. It 

 has in it the makings of a broad and practical social 

 philosophy applicable to numerous questions connected 



[195] 



