i9o6.] JORDAN— THE HUMAN HARVEST. 69 



human harvest is good, so long as the movement of history, the 

 progress of peace and industry leaves for the future not the worst 

 but the best of each generation. The Republic of Rome lasted so 

 long as there were Romans, the Republic of America will last so long 

 as its people, in blood and in spirit, remain what we have learned to 

 call Americans. 



By the law of probabilities as developed by Quetelet, there will 

 appear in each generation the same number of potential poets, artists, 

 investigators, patriots, athletes and superior men of each degree. 



But this law involves the theory of continuity of paternity, that 

 in each generation a percentage practically equal of men of superior 

 force or superior mentality should survive to take the responsibilities 

 of parenthood. Otherwise Quetelet's law becomes subject to the 

 operation of another law, the operation of reversed selection, or the 

 biological " law of diminishing returns." In other words, breeding 

 from an inferior stock is the sole agency in race degeneration, as 

 selection natural or artificial along one line or another is the sole 

 agency in race progress. 



And all laws of probabilities and of averages are subject to a 

 still higher law, the primal law of biology, which no cross-current of 

 life can overrule or modifv : Like the seed is the harvest. 



