THE GOSPEL OF SCIENCE 11 



doubt the author of the addresses would say that 

 it was no part of his business to explain this 

 matter ; that he took this system of Nature as a 

 going system and did his best to explain it as such 

 and without attempting, perhaps even without 

 desiring, to explain how it got a-going. If that 

 be the case, and if ignorance on this head must 

 be his confession, it is a little difficult to under- 

 stand the confidence with which he sets himself 

 to discuss the " extraordinary and far-reaching 

 changes in public opinion [which] are coming to 

 pass." We shall find these, as we pass them in 

 review, to be extraordinary enough, though not 

 very new. 



In the first place, " genetic research will make 

 it possible for a nation to elect by what sort of 

 beings it will be represented not very many 

 generations hence, much as a farmer can decide 

 whether his byres shall be full of shorthorns or 

 Herefords. It will be very surprising indeed if 

 some nation does not make trial of this new power. 

 They may make awful mistakes, but I think they 

 will try " (S., p. 8). It is curious how the war, 

 which had just commenced when these addresses 

 were being delivered, has absolutely disposed, 

 or ought to have disposed, of some of the pro- 

 phecies of the President. Nothing, at any rate, 

 seems more certain than that one result of this 

 most disastrous struggle will be an urgent demand 

 by all the States engaged in it for at least as many 

 male children as the mothers of each country can 

 supply, without special regard to their other 

 characters^ breedable or not breedable. We are 



