4 MARRIAGE AND DISEASE. 



inexorable and unescapable is this law of hereditary 

 transmission of disease, or of liability thereto. 



Sir James Paget has said, " If one could set before 

 one's self the gravest and most important problem in 

 all pathology, it would be that which concerns the 

 inheritance of disease; and, as Sir William Gull has 

 rightly stated, the inheritance not of disease alone, 

 but of that which from generation to generation shall 

 obliterate the disease which one ancestor may have 

 acquired." * This is undoubtedly true, and until this 

 most important problem is more deeply studied and 

 more clearly understood, it is certain that the physician 

 will not be able to exercise to the full his highest func- 

 tion, which is not to cure, but to prevent disease. 



At present the public appear to know little of this 

 law of hereditary transmission as applicable to them- 

 selves, or, if they know it, they ignore it. For while 

 we are most careful not to transgress this law of 

 Nature in the breeding of our horses and cattle, and 

 even our dogs and cats, few of us appear to give a 

 moment's thought as to what may be the physical, 

 moral, or mental inheritance of our children. This 

 disregard must arise from either ignorance or careless- 

 ness, and it is the duty of the physician to make it 

 impossible for any man to plead the former. Surely 

 in these days of almost free education, when the 

 elements of physiology are taught in every school, it 

 should not be difficult to impress upon the minds of 

 boys and girls the fact that this law of hereditary 

 * Address on Collective Investigation of Disease. 



