2o8 THE FAMILY AND THE NATION 



of paramount importance to inquire what classes of the 

 community are reproducing themselves fastest. Natural 

 selection eliminates the unfit, and thus secures that 

 the parents most suited to the existing environment, 

 on the whole, shall rear most offspring. But we find 

 that civilization of the modern European type intro- 

 duces an artificial selection, whereby the best stocks 

 restrict voluntarily the number of their offspring ; 

 while, owing to improved conditions of life and direct 

 subsidies from the community, the least successful 

 sections of the population are able to escape the 

 severity of nature and to multiply rapidly. 



Arithmetical calculation shows that, if one section of 

 a people reproduce itself faster, even to a slight degree, 

 than the rest, it will rapidly surpass all other sections 

 in numbers, and, after a few generations, dominate the 

 whole of the nation. 



A study of the birth-rate of different classes of the 

 British people brings out the fact that the average 

 number of children, in the family that produces children 

 at all, has now, in the great mass of the more successful 

 part of the nation, fallen below one-half its value forty 

 or fifty years ago. The titled and untitled landed 

 aristocracy, the more eminent of the official, professional, 

 and commercial classes, show the same result, while it 

 extends equally to the thrifty and provident skilled 

 artisans. The only sections of these classes which 

 maintain their birth-rate at its old high level are the 

 clergy, the Roman Catholics, and the Jews. Two 

 hundred thousand births fewer each year than should 

 be expected now take place in the British Isles — one- 

 fifth of the annual total. And this fifth that is wanting 



