i2 4 HEREDITY AND SOCIETY 



and pleasure of the present fleeting generation, we may 

 but revert to the usual position by another road. 



The older statesmen had a larger outlook than some 

 of those of to-day. The theory of power, which was 

 replaced first by the principle of protection and then 

 by the economic and social theories of free trade and 

 laissez-faire , contemplated a strong and sound, self- 

 reliant nation both from the economic and military 

 points of view as the object to be kept steadily before 

 the eyes. The methods by which this goal was sought 

 were frequently defective, especially from the economic 

 side ; but the consciousness that aggregate economic 

 wealth was not the only or even the highest object 

 of government was a better foundation for political 

 thought than the greedy protectionism or the doctrinaire 

 Manchesterismus which successively replaced it. 



Now a " theory of power " which takes account of 

 modern biological knowledge in a strenuous effort to 

 improve the physical, mental and moral state of the 

 race both by environment and heredity, and by their 

 interaction one on the other, seems to us a good basis 

 for political endeavour. We do not claim for it finality 

 or even completeness. But it gives a point of view 

 which has been almost entirely overlooked in modern 

 times, and one which is more likely to lead in the 

 future to many of the conditions which politicians wish 

 to secure than the seemingly more direct roads, some 

 of which, when followed, drop into intervening chasms 

 and quagmires. 



For, if we can raise the innate qualities of our race, 

 so that it becomes abler, stronger and more efficient, 

 not only will it be in a state to take better advantage 



