REPRODUCTION AND SEX 585 



to develop what is normally there already — a feeling of kinship, 

 an awareness that we stand and fall together, a pride of race. 

 Certainly not to cloud the horizon with responsibilities prematurely 

 anticipated, but to educate the conscience by the discharge of 

 duties which, though real and not fictitious, are yet appropriate to 

 youth. 



To talk about teaching a pupil racial responsibility is to betray 

 a detachment from realities. What we need to discover is the 

 appropriate sunshine and rain and fresh air for certain buds which 

 lie ready to be awakened to growth. We must seek for what 

 physiologists call the liberating stimuli, and there are three whose 

 efficacy is sure. First of all, there is: — 



(a) The artistic stimulus, through poem and picture, through song 

 and story, through the history of our race and the lives of its heroes. 

 As one of our wisest educationists has said: "The power that may 

 be exercised in the formation of character by the presentment of 

 ideal types is as yet very imperfectly utiHsed." It is our problem to 

 think out a strategy — of working towards a eugenic conscience, 

 and to learn the tactics of artistic appeal. For the young mind, each 

 in its own secret and unconscious recapitulation, is hereditarily 

 open to the thrill of the undying voices of the past. It may seem a 

 strange route to the Eugenic ideal, but is it not the surest that we 

 know ? 



"Let statue, picture, park, and hall. 

 Ballad, flag, and festival. 

 The past restore, the day adorn, 

 And make to-morrow a new morn. 

 So shall the drudge in dusty frock 

 Spy behind the city clock 

 Retinues of airy kings, 

 Skirts of angels, starry wings. 

 His fathers shining in bright fables. 

 His children fed at heavenly tables, 

 'Tis the privilege of Art 

 Thus to play its cheerful part. 



(b) The second stimulus is in action. Whatever you do, Stanley 

 Hall says somewhere, don't lecture. One does not require to read 

 Stalky and Co. to be sure of the futility of eugenic "jaws". For, as 

 far as character is concerned, it is by living that we learn. And 

 just as the play of animals is now recognised to be of vital importance 

 as a rehearsal for the serious business of life, so there is much to be 

 said for the proposition that the most effective citizens are often 

 those who learned in their youth what it is to play the game. For 

 that means self-expression tempered by loyalty, individual effort 

 and yet subordination to the good of the whole, and besides that, 

 the discipline of looking forward. The characteristics that may 



