Eugenics as a Creed and the Last Decade of Galton's Life 283 



my knowledge taken any serious step to solve this important problem, though the value of the 

 present elaborate system of examinations cannot be rightly estimated until it is solved." 

 (pp. 533-4.) 



Here Galton's judgment must appeal to every thoughtful man. Educa- 

 tional methods both in teaching and examination are put into practice on 

 the balance of opinion in committees, or even by the arbitrary will of par- 

 ticular headmasters, and when the system is developed no attempt is made 

 to determine statistically whether it really achieves what it professes to do. 

 The preparatory schools prepare for the public schools' examinations, the 

 public schools are again in their teaching controlled by the examinations on 

 which the universities distribute their prizes, and finally distinction in the 

 academic graduation examinations is an all-important factor in many lucra- 

 tive appointments. Our educational system may be the very best available, 

 as apparently its administrators believe it to be ; but public confidence in it 

 would be based on a firmer footing if those administrators would occasionally 

 take stock and prove to us that the promise of youth has been fulfilled in 

 adult performance. We debate and we legislate, we educate and we examine — 

 and never take the trouble to inquire after a few years whether the results 

 we aimed at have been achieved ! 



Galton next turns to the question of the augmentation of favoured stock. 

 It is clear that the improvement of the stock of a nation depends on our power 

 of increasing the productivity of its best members. He considers this of more 

 importance than repressing the productivity of the worst stock ; he does not 

 give his reasons for this view, possibly he holds the production of one 

 superman to be in the long run more profitable to a nation than the repression 

 of fifty subhumans ; it is better to spend all available funds in the production 

 of men of outstanding civic worth, rather than in the reduction of the number 

 of undesirables. Galton's main proposal certainly would involve considerable 

 expense ; it is that his youths and maidens, selected for all types of outstanding 

 civic worth, should be put under conditions where early marriage is feasible 

 and large families are not detrimental to success. He holds that with able 

 and cultured women in particular there might be a reduction in the age at 

 marriage from 28 or 29 to 21 or 22, thus prolonging marriage by seven years. 

 This would not only save from barrenness the earlier part of the childbearing 

 period of these women, but would shorten each generation by some seven years. 

 Galton considers that it is no absurd idea that outside influences should hasten 

 the age of marriage or lead the best to marry the best. " A superficial 

 objection is sure to be urged that the fancies of young people are so in- 

 calculable and so irresistible that they cannot be guided." So they are — in 

 the exceptional case which only proves the contrary rule*. But the anthro- 

 pologist is only too familiar with the fact that marriage is the most custom- 

 ridden institution of humanity, and the variations in its customs are as 

 wide as the races of mankind. At least 95 °'/ o of men and women marry not 

 only according to the custom of their nation, but according to the habits of 



* Galton cites as such the lady who scandalised her domestic circle by falling in love with 

 the undertaker at her father's funeral and insisting on marrying him ! 



p a in . 30 



