THE PROBLEM OF THE FUTURE 3 



of these problems would never be reached by verbal 

 discussion ; that the principles of evolution could not be 

 profitably applied to human societies by popular lecturers 

 or by discussion clubs ; still less could sociological problems 

 be solved by the methods of political argument, or of philo- 

 sophical reasoning. Well, you will again tell me, that this 

 is common knowledge. So, perhaps, it is, or shall I say, 

 it very nearly is ? For I picked up a journal termed the 

 Sociological Review the other day, and the first article 

 that attracted my attention was by a distinguished 

 professor of philosophy, entitled ' National Degeneracy ', 

 and the problem was solved to the satisfaction of the 

 professor in some ten pages of type, without a single 

 figure, without a single sign that he had knowledge of 

 the immense biological complexity of a question which 

 for a true answer needs not verbal disquisition but an 

 intensive study of heredity in man, of differential marriage 

 rates, differential fertihty, selective death-rates, to say 

 nothing of immigration and emigration, and of the 

 correlation of all these with the social and antisocial 

 qualities of the several reproductive groups in the com- 

 munity. No, I think there are still some exceptions to 

 the universality of this negative knowledge ! Do we not 

 still occasionally see the most fundamental problems of 

 our national and social life settled without a single 

 appeal to reUable data, or to rehable data properly 

 interpreted, from the hustings, in our fitly termed parlia- 

 ment, or in the almost greater parliament of the press ? 

 Let us remember that these were the sources whence our 

 working classes drew most of their knowledge, and that 

 Seeley thought that we ought to be in a position to give 

 them something better. 



How ' better ' ? That was the question rapidty thrust 



