154 THE DESCENT OF MAN. 



cuk off in the direct line, and their wealth flows into some- 

 side channel ; but unfortunately this channel is not 

 determined by superiority of any kind. 



Although civilization thus checks in many ways the action 

 of natural selection, it apparently favors the better develop- 

 ment of the body, by means of good food and the freedom 

 from occasional hardships, This may be inferred from 

 civilized men having been found, wherever compared, to he 

 physically stronger than savages.* They appear also to have 

 equal powers of endurance, as has been proved in many 

 adventurous expeditions. Even the great luxury of the 

 rich can be but little detrimental; for the expectation of 

 life cf our aristocracy, at all ages and of both sexes, is very 

 little inferior to that of healthy English lives in the lower 

 classes, f 



We will now look to the intellectual faculties. If in 

 each grade of society the members were divided into two 

 equal bodies, the one including the intellectually superior 

 and the other the inferior, there can be little doubt that the 

 former would succeed best in all occupations, and rear a 

 greater number of children. Even in the lowest walks oi 

 life, skill and ability must be of some advantage; though 

 in many occupations, owing to the great division of labor, 

 a very small one. Hence in civilized nations there will bo 

 some tendency to an increase both in the number and in 

 the standard of the intellectually able. But I do not wish 

 to assert that this tendency may not be more than counter- 

 balanced in other ways, as by the multiplication of the reck- 

 less and improvident; but even to such as these, ability 

 mittt be some advantage. 



It has often been objected to views like the foregoing, 

 that the most eminent men who have ever lived have left 

 ,no offspring to inherit their great intellect. Mr. Gal ton 

 says: J " I regret I am unable to solve the simple question 

 whether, and how far. men and women who are prodigies 

 of genius are infertile. I have, however, shown that men 

 of eminence are by no means so." Great lawgivers, the 



* Quat.-efages, "Revue des Cours Scieutifiques," lbCT-68, p. 659. 



f See the fifth and sixth columns, compiled from good authorities, 

 in the table given in Mr. E. K. Laukester's " Comparative Longev 

 it;, "1870. p. 115. 



J " Hereditary Genius/' 1870, p. 330. 



