98 THE MENDEL JOURNAL 



too, through the channel of their parents. It is 

 implied that the evil propensities of the one will be 

 diluted, in the processes of heredity, by the goodness 

 of the other. It seems, however, to be forgotten 

 that, even if it be true, the goodness is diluted too. 

 But if the processes of segregation and gametic 

 purity are operating in Man, there is an end of this 

 belief. For no marriage of fit with unfit, of virtue 

 with vice, of truth with falsehood, of courage with 

 cowardice, and of physical vigour with physical 

 weakness will result in any diminution of the alterna- 

 tive bad qualities. Marriage will merely procreate 

 and multiply the individuals who manifest them. 

 When Friedrich Nietzsche, in his " Thus Spake 

 Zarathustra," wrote the three following paragraphs 

 in the chapter " Of Child and Marriage," he was 

 nearer than he imagined to the truth, and he antici- 

 pated, in a few words, the Eugenic doctrines of the 

 present : — 



" Worthy and ripe for the significance of earth 

 appeared this man unto me, but when I saw his wife 

 earth seemed unto me a madhouse." 



" Yea, I wish the earth would tremble in convul- 

 sions whenever a saint and a goose couple." 



" This one went out for truths like a hero, and at 

 last secured a little dressed-up lie. He calleth it his 

 marriage." 



The follies and impulses of youth are proverbial ; 

 even the youth who ultimately may blossom into genius 

 or to a high degree of civic worth, and in his maturity 

 may aspire to high ideals, is not free from the errors 



