30 HEREDITY AND SOCIETY 



the State that is, by the labour of their more com- 

 petent fellow-men. They fill the workhouses, for 

 they cannot regularly support themselves ; they fill the 

 prisons, for much of the petty crime of the country 

 is due to feebleness of mind and is simply a hereditary 

 disease. Feeble-minded women are specially prolific, 

 and return again and again to the maternity wards of 

 our hospitals and infirmaries to add yet another to 

 the defective population. Several years ago, a Royal 

 Commission reported in favour of the compulsory and 

 permanent care and detention of the feeble-minded ; 

 but nothing has yet been done to carry their recom- 

 mendations into effect. Every year of delay in 

 meeting this urgent evil means a new crop of victims 

 falling inevitably and irretrievably into the worst forms 

 of degradation, and an ever-growing number of defec- 

 tive offspring, brought into the world to be a burden 

 and a shame to the rest of the nation. 



It must always be remembered that the existence of 

 this class of people is directly due to that interference 

 with natural selection which is the outcome of the un- 

 regulated humanitarianism of Western society. While 

 failing to give them the protection which is necessary 

 to their enfeebled mental powers, the State has never- 

 theless created conditions which make possible their 

 continued and successful reproduction. As we have 

 said before, in a primitive community, types much 

 below the average of the tribe either in mental or 

 physical capacity can neither maintain their footing, 

 nor earn the means of subsistence. Consequently 

 their defect dies with them, and the purification of the 

 race is assured. Nations of a somewhat more advanced 



