116 Lift' and Letterx of Francin Galton 



the eogwncy of intuition in these cases; then wliy should the theoIogianH of 

 to-dav, if Hummoned on the grounds ol" ohservation or statistics to give ui) 

 a belief which has far less chiim to be considered an intuition, start with 

 naive indignation, as at a previously unheard-of and most unreasonable 

 interference'? 



I do not think Galton propounded his thesis of the statistical inefficacy 

 of prayer — as Clifford in other like niattei-s stated he did — with the view of 

 "draw'ing" The Spectator. He came to his topic naturally and unexpectedly. 

 In his study of the ' Divines' for his Heredifari/ Genius, he had been struck 

 by "their wretched constitutions" (see our p. 101). To obtain a measure of 

 this Galton investigated their age at death, and compared it with that of other 

 classes. Using Chalmers's Biography and The Annual Jtegistcr, Galton found 



Galton holds that the clergy are a far more 'prayerful class' than lawyers 

 or doctors, and yet, although the numerous publisned collections of family 

 prayers are full of petitions for temporal benefits, and the prayei-s of the clergy 

 are for protection against the perils and dangers of the night and of the day 

 and for recovery from sickness, such prayers appear to be futile in result'. The 

 alx>ve statistics are for eminent men, and therefore may be supposed to be in 

 the case of ' Divines' for tho.se of marked piety. Galton also cites Guy's data" 

 which provide the following figures: 



Menibcra of Royal Houses 6404 



Artists 6.5-96 



Medical Men 67-31 



Men of Literature and Science 67-55 



Lawyers 68*14 



Clergy 69 49 



Gentry 7(1-2-2 



Mean age at deitth. 



The members of the Royal Houses are the persons whose longevity is 

 most widely and continuously prayed for, and they have the least average 

 length of life! But the mass of clergy — as distinct from eminent divines — 

 have a longer life than the mass of lawyers or medical men. Galton attri- 

 butes this to the easy country life, family repose, and sanitary conditions, but 

 his critics might well have attributed the result to the greater prayerfulness 

 of the lesser clergy. The greater length of life of the clergy iis a whole is 

 now a well-established actuarial fact, but probably to-day no one aasociates 

 it with prayerfulness. Galton gives a good many illustrations of the want of 

 efficacy in prayer, e.g. the relatively short lives of missionaries, the distribu- 

 tion of still-births as between clergy and laymen being wholly unaffected by 



' Letter of Galton to The Spectator, 1872, August 24. In editorials and correspondence the 

 discuiMion lastod from the issue of August 3 until that of .September 7. 



' Fortnightly (loc. eil.), p. 129. ' Jounud of R. Statitt. Society, Vol. xxn, p. 355. 



