THE PROBLEM OF VICE .\ND CRIME igg 



plied in spite of the laws. Laws have as yet not 

 touched the heart of the problems which are 

 pressing upon us. Social theorists have done 

 little more. 



Single-tax men would bring the millennium by 

 putting all taxes on land ; and labour-reformers 

 would bring a better day by a revolution in the 

 social order. Whatever the wisdom or folly of 

 these schemes, they have as yet scarcely touched 

 the stern conditions of increasing degeneration. 

 Until the movement of heredity is changed, 

 physical and moral deterioration will move side 

 by side in ever-expanding streams. In the long 

 run no reform can prevail which does not look 

 toward the creation of a sober, clean, and law- 

 abiding stock. If a temperance revival were to 

 result in all the inmates of a tenement house of 

 adult years signing the pledge, and even if the 

 further marvel should come to pass that they keep 

 it, that would be no sure ground for supposing 

 that the children born during the years of their 

 parents' inebriety will continue temperate. If, on 

 the other hand, the region where those people 

 lived is changed ; if they are accustomed to virtue 

 and decency, and have before them examples of 

 true manhood and womanhood, and are enabled so 

 to live that home is a blessed fact and not a farce, 



