268 Life and Letters of Francis Galton 



Further, with the resources of modern civilisation, we are in a favourable 

 position to accelerate this evolution. The world is gradually becoming self- 

 conscious, and I think Mr Galton has made a very strong plea for a determined 

 effort to attempt a conscious evolution of the race " (pp. 18-19). Dr F. W. Mott 

 was strongly in favour of the segregation of defective children, and would 

 encourage the State to set up registry offices, which could give a bill of health 

 to persons contracting marriage, and these bills would have actuarial value not 

 only for the possessors but for their children, and should enable them to obtain 

 insurance at a lower rate*. Mr A. E. Crawley said that Galton's remarkable 

 and suggestive paper indicated how anthropological studies can be made of 

 service in practical politics. He considered that the science of Eugenics should 

 be founded on anthropology, psychology and physiology — thus leaving out 

 genetics, actuarial science and medicine, all equally if not more important ! 

 The part that Galton suggested religion might play in Eugenics seemed 

 to the speaker excellent. "Religion can have no higher duty than to 

 insist upon the sacredness of marriage, but just as the meaning and 

 content of that sacredness were the result of primitive science, so modern 

 science must advise as to what this sacredness involves for us in our 

 vastly changed conditions, complicated needs and increased responsibilities " 

 (p. 21). 



Dr Westermarck thoroughly approved of Galton's programme, and said 

 that Galton had appealed to historical facts to show how restrictions in 

 marriage have occurred ; he saw no reason why the restrictions should not 

 be extended far beyond the existing laws of any civilised nation of to-day. 

 He drew attention to tribes which made an exhibition of courage essential 

 to the permission granted a man to marry, to German and Austrian laws 

 prohibiting the marriage of paupers, and he saw no reason why similar laws 

 should not be extended to persons who would "in all probability" become 

 parents of feeble or diseased offspring. " We cannot wait till biology has said 

 its last word on heredity. We do not allow lunatics to walk freely about 

 even though there may be merely a suspicion that they may be dangerous. 

 I think that the doctor ought to have a voice in every marriage which is 

 contracted... men are not generally allowed to do mischief in order to gratify 

 their own appetites." 



Besides increased legal restriction Dr Westermarck thought that moral 

 education would help to promote Eugenicsf . Dr Westermarck concluded with 



* This corresponds to the idea on p. 243 above of attaching medical certificates to the 

 State sickness and old-age pensions scheme. 



"j" This has, owing chiefly to the efforts of Galton, progressed largely during the past 25 

 years. Quite a number of persons have developed the eugenic conscience, and A seeks advice 

 as to whether it is social to marry B ; or C, having married I), as to whether it is antisocial 

 to have further children who may turn out like E. The Galton Laboratory is not at present 

 organised on a scale to answer such problems, although it does its best to do so; but the time 

 is rapidly approaching when an institution above reproach from the medical standpoint, and 

 equipped with a staff conversant with the various branches of human heredity and of genealogical 

 study, might issue case-opinions and certificates. In the distant future it might hope to be 

 self-supporting. 



