44 HEREDITY AND CHRISTIAN PROBLEMS 



In making this plain we shall study the action of 

 heredity in pauperism, vice, and crime. 



The moral nature is subject to hereditary law. 

 It is so in the sense that a disposition, a habib 

 of the will, a condition of temperament, may be 

 transmitted, and may become a force so strong 

 as to be almost irresistible. Lecky says : " There 

 are men whose whole lives are spent in willing 

 one thing and der>iring the opposite," which is 

 only a variation of the apostle's words, " But I 

 see another law in my members, warring against 

 the law in my mind." (Romans vii. 23.) 



James I. of England and VI. of Scotland is 

 one of the most mournful figures in English 

 annals. How could it be otherwise with the son 

 of Mary, Queen of Scots, and her first cousin, 

 Darnley, whom she married when she was only 

 nineteen years of age .-' 



It was not strange that Agrippina, wife of 

 Germanicus, should have been the mother of 

 Caligula, and of that still more detestable Agrip- 

 pina, the mother of Nero. Nor was it strange 

 that Domitius, who married the second Agrippina, 

 should have said that from himself and his wife 

 nothing good could come.^ 



Lord Byron's mother is thus described : " Little 



1 Parejits" Guide^ Mrs. Hester Pendleton, p. 32. 



