42 HEREDITY. 



upon three conditions : ( i ) a knowledge of the 

 law involved; (2) a desire to do the right or 

 obey the law; (3) the self control and will pow- 

 er to follow his desire. Jesus Christ, the perfect 



doRi 8 ht bmty * man > born as the ideal of the Father, had a per- 

 fect knowledge of all law; had all desire to do 

 right, had the freedom and strength of will requi- 

 site to enable Him to follow His desires and 

 was, therefore, absolutely responsible in the bal- 

 ance of morals, for His every act. The. unfor- 

 tunate man born just a little above the brute, 

 with so little intelligence that he does not com- 

 prehend the law, with so much of propensity and 

 so little of sentiment that he has no desire to do 

 right, and so weak in will power that he has 

 no control over his gross appetites, is absolutely 

 irresponsible for his conduct in the balance of 

 morals. Between these two extremes all hu- 

 manity is found. The moral responsibility of 

 each individual depends upon his position on the 

 scale. As there is but one Christ, one absolutely 

 responsible character, so there are very few who 

 are totally irresponsible. 



The question of the moral responsibility of 

 criminals is a vital one, whether considered from 

 a legal, a psychological or an ethical point of 



of^imSr view ' According to modern biology man is a 

 creature of heredity and environment. From 

 this point of view the abnormal man is scarcely 

 responsible for his crime ; but according to recent 

 experiments in psychology the soul the ego- 

 is supreme and is far less subject to inherited or 

 acquired tendencies than has generally been sup- 

 posed. Whatever there is in the new psychology 



