8 MARRIAGE AND DISEASE. 



Many high authorities have expressed the opinion 

 that those suffering under gross hereditary disease, or 

 tendency thereto, should not be permitted to continue 

 their like, and so contaminate the race, but I 'fear the 

 day for such legislation has not yet come. Moreover, 

 I think it only fair to assume that much of the present 

 continuance of transmitted disease is the result of 

 ignorance on the part of the people, and, on this 

 assumption, some effort should be made to educate 

 them to a knowledge of how terribly relentless and 

 .unavoidable is this law of Nature, before calling upon 

 the Legislature to interfere in what might be so 

 much better done by public opinion and individual 

 effort. 



Much might also be done by pointing out how some 

 of these tainted constitutions may be acquired de novo ; 

 how the man or woman whose family has a clean bill 

 of health can by wicked and vicious habits build up 

 insanity, or epilepsy, or phthisis, or gout, etc., to be 

 handed down to posterity, and how other diseases may 

 be acquired which shall have a terrible effect upon 

 children afterwards begotten. It should also be taught 

 how a man or woman with a bad family history may, 

 by a steady and virtuous life, a strict observance of the 

 laws of health, and proper care in the selection of a 

 partner, live down the evil, so to speak, and leave 

 an unencumbered estate to the children of the next 

 generation. 



When these things have been taught and found 

 ineffectual, but not till then, should the Legislature be 



