Selective Breeding 41 



during, or after birth. Pathogenic bacteria 

 are not incorporated in the germ plasm itself. 

 Syphilis and tuberculosis are the most impor- 

 tant infections that may in this way be passed 

 along. While venereal and constitutional dis- 

 eases are thus spread by direct infection, they 

 may eventually so poison the germ plasm itself 

 that the offspring will be feeble and ailing 

 although not having a specific disease. The 

 lesson from all this is that candidates for 

 marriage should always be obliged by the State 

 to submit to a thorough medical examination to 

 prove not only their freedom from specific infec- 

 tions but that their systems have not been 

 unduly weakened from previous attacks of con- 

 stitutional disease. Applicants for marriage 

 licenses should be obliged to prove that they 

 are physically as well as financially fit for 

 marriage. ^ 



Perhaps the next great danger consists in the 

 inheritance of various neurotic tendencies. 

 While nervous disease itself may not be passed 

 along, certain abnormal and unstable states may 

 eventuate in various forms of insanity, as well 



