INTRODUCTION 5 



unaided, suffice to improve the race. Had they but 

 watched the results and understood the methods of 

 practical cattle-breeders, whose labours, though still 

 in the empirical stage, were already transforming the 

 nature of our flocks and herds, they would have 

 appreciated the fact that improvement in the environ- 

 ment alone would do little for a race compared with 

 the transcendent power of selective breeding. 



Nevertheless, improvement in surroundings and 

 social conditions represents the only conscious share 

 taken hitherto by man in raising the level of his race, 

 and for its own sake, it is worthy of the efforts made 

 to secure it. But the measures used to bring about 

 such an amelioration require to be scrutinized carefully, 

 both in regard to their immediate effects and to their 

 possible indirect influence on future generations. 



From the racial point of view, there is at least one 

 advantage in lightening the pressure of circumstances 

 on the lower ranks of society. There are always a 

 certain number of families at the bottom of each social 

 stratum that have fallen through accident, such as the 

 death or ill-health of the bread-winner, a change of 

 trade, or other external cause. With improved sur- 

 roundings and greater opportunities of self-help, 

 people of this type will readily separate themselves 

 out from the families who have fallen into the depths 

 by reason of the badness of their inborn qualities. 

 Thus a new classification is obtained, which is of real 

 value from the point of view of the race. Fresh 

 recruits are obtained for the effective sections of the 

 communal life, and the residue can be more justly 

 dealt with as a separate problem of degeneration. 



