ATROPHY OF INSTITUTIONS FROM LACK OF USE 291 



by a diminution in their birth-rate, but in some 

 cases there may be a direct elimination of them. 1 



The tendency of decadence is always towards the 

 degenerative and eliniinatory selection of superior 

 elements. 



It may be said in conclusion that there are 

 constant calls upon the capital and labour of a 

 society from its various institutions, and the conse- 

 quence is that, the resources not being unlimited, a 

 regular struggle for existence goes on amongst the 

 institutions. In the course of this struggle, the 

 decline of an institution may be brought about 

 in two different ways. It either begins to de- 

 generate from lack of sufficient means of support, 

 or degeneration sets in consequent upon the insti- 

 tution having ceased to be functional by inutility, 

 by transference of function to another institution, 

 or by obstacles placed in the way of exercising 

 that function. In either case the institution dis- 

 appears. It is only in exceptional cases, which 

 will be alluded to further on, that existence is 

 still maintained. 



1 G. de Lapouge, La Vie et la Mart des nations (R6vue int. de 

 Sociologie, 1894, pp. 421 and following). Several terms used 

 in this treatise were borrowed from the above article. 



See also Hovelacque and Herve, Precis d' Anthropologie, p. 189 : 

 ' ' War, in its double consequence of the elimination of the strong 

 and the survival of the weak, is for the more civilized races a 

 powerful factor in the cause of degeneration and downfall," 



