LATE MARRIAGES. 257 



imperfect in mind and body. And the further the 

 vital tide has receded in the parent, the farther 

 removed from the high-water mark of perfection 

 will be the children. 



I have said, in the preceding chapter, that whether 

 the lack of vitality in the parent or parents arises 

 from immaturity, disease, exhaustion, or old age, 

 the effect upon the offspring is the same. This is 

 true, yet it is not the whole truth. The late Dr. 

 Griesinger of Berlin, speaking of idiocy, says: " In 

 families where epilepsy, mental disease, paralytic 

 affections, deaf-dumbness are frequent, idiocy is also 

 observed to be common. Frequently it occurs as a 

 mere partial phenomenon, as an individual manifes- 

 tation of a general degeneration of the race : thus 

 we see, in a number of brothers and sisters, one or 

 two idiots, together with others who are small, in- 

 completely developed, ugly, and sterile. These de- 

 generations are observed in families . . . where the 

 parents have been too old or too young."* Here 

 the children of the immature and the senile are 

 classed together, as is usual. They have much in 

 common. Both are sadly wanting in vital power 

 and in perfection of development, physical, mental, 

 and moral. Hence we have a vastly greater percent- 

 age of idiots, deaf-mutes, insane, epileptics, thieves, 

 cripples, dwarfs, drunkards, and sterile individuals 

 among both classes than we can discover among the 

 children of mature parentage. But although they 

 * " Mental Pathology and Therapeutics," Syd. Soc. 



OF THE 



UNIVERSITY 



OF 



