SOCIAL AND PHYSIOLOGICAL INEQUALITY. 761 



acquired by the slow processes of evolution to appreciate the prepon- 

 derating influence of heredity in the manifestation of will-power and 

 kindred phenomena. Two individuals may start in life apparently 

 with equal chances and hindrances. One succeeds, the other fails ; 

 one is only stimulated by obstacles, the other is disheartened and con- 

 quered by them ; one has inherent possibilities in his nature that are 

 utterly absent in the other. The mysterious potentialities of different 

 natures are often more easy of recognition than of explanation. There 

 are many peculiar and. diverse ways in which the action of the moral 

 nature is exhibited, according to its development, in human affairs. 

 Thus some men display most exemplary conduct in certain relations of 

 family and society, but show an utter absence of the moral sense in 

 dealing with competitors. 



There are, unfortunately, at the present time, too many object-les- 

 sons exemplifying a strangely irregular moral development. Wen who 

 calmly exhibit the greatest depravity in pushing schemes for their own 

 interest, recklessly bribing officials and buying legislators, may yet 

 show apparently the record of a most proper private life. A man who 

 wrecks a bank, thereby spreading distress and ruin wide-spread, is 

 found to be the kindest of fathers. The evil done by forcing a corner 

 in the market that will put some of the necessaries of life beyond the 

 reach of the needy multitude, can not be compensated for by subscrib- 

 ing to a charity. Railroad-wrecking and dishonest speculation form 

 an incongruous mixture with benevolence. Qualities that are subver- 

 sive of all civic virtues and tend to the very disintegration of society, 

 appear to flourish by the side of a sort of goodness, finding expression, 

 perhaps, in one or two directions. 



The faculty of the mind, as well as the organ of the body, that is 

 used the most, undergoes the highest development and works with 

 preponderating efficiency. If there is an absence of a properly reg- 

 ulated human and moral feeling to hold a check on such excessive 

 keenness, the results are unfortunate. The over-development of acquis- 

 itiveness and the under-clevelopment of certain moral faculties, have 

 enabled individuals to distance competitors and crowd better men to 

 the wall. Some men may have too high a sense of honor to compete 

 successfully with others not so endowed. Doubtless, many of the shift- 

 less and lazy like to consider that they are too honest to succeed. But 

 often this is true of better men. Intense selfishness is too exclusively 

 the mainspring of endeavor in our modern civilization. While the 

 inferior development of physical and mental functions keeps a large 

 proportion of mankind in unequal subjugation to the minority, the 

 under-development of certain parts of the moral nature is actually an 

 aid to worldly success. This is a pregnant thought, and shows how 

 the development theory can throw side-lights on all angles of a social 

 question. 



There is, then, a direct relation between an individual's hereditv and 



48* 



