200 HEREDITY IN RELATION TO EUGENICS 



4. The Salvation of the Race thkough Heredity 



Heredity is often regarded as a terrible fact; that we suffer 

 limitations because of the composition of our germ plasm is 

 a blow to pride and ambition. But, on the other hand, 

 with Umitation in capacity goes Umitation in responsibility. 

 Those who held the hazy doctrine of freedom of the mil must 

 have postulated uniformity of capacity for discriminating 

 between right and wrong and uniformity in responsiveness to 

 similar stimuli. Of course such an assumption is false. How 

 we respond to any stimulus depends on the nature of our 

 protoplasm.V The nature of the respo^emay be modifie d by 

 training, by the formation of habits; but the result of train- 

 ing is, wiHun Umlts, determined by the impressibili ty of the 

 protoplasm. So I do not condemn my neighbor however 

 "regrettable or dangerous he may be.^ 



And while heredity limits capacity in one point it ex- 

 tends it in others. If I have mental limitations, I have also 

 gifts of natural health, of physical vigor, of persistence, and 

 so on. Thus, as there is hardly a strain of human germ 

 plasm that is without some defect or Umitation so there is 

 hardly a strain without the determiner of some admirable 

 characteristic. While education and moral and religious in- 

 struction may do much to develop one's native traits, he- 

 redity can introduce the desirable determiner that will make 

 such training more useful or less necessary. Indeed, while 

 by good conditions we help the individual to make the most 

 of himself, by good breeding we establish a permanent strain 

 that is strong in its very constitution. The experience of 

 animal and plant breeders who have been able by appro- 

 priate crosses to increase the vigor and productivity of their 

 stock and crops should lead us to see that proper matings are 

 the greatest means of permanently improving the human 

 race — of saving it from imbecihty, poverty, disease and im- 

 morality. 



