HUMAN PROGRESS : PAST AND FUTURE 509 



which have so often stunted and debased human nature 

 instead of improving it, are powerless to transmit by 

 heredity either their good or their evil effects ; and for 

 this limitation of their power we ought to be thankful. 

 It follows, that when we are wise enough to reform our 

 social economy and give to our youth a truer, a broader, 

 and a more philosophical training, we shall find their 

 minds free from any hereditary taint derived from the evil 

 customs and mistaken teaching of the past, and ready to 

 respond at once to that higher ideal of life and of the 

 responsibilities of marriage which will, indirectly yet 

 surely, become the greatest factor in human progress. 



