SOCIAL HEREDITY 289 



subject peoples, and slave peoples. They were 

 extended to various grades and classes of society 

 in the United Kingdom, to boys embraced in the 

 boy scout movement, and to children at schools 

 and public institutions. In all the studies I 

 was concerned primarily with the subject of 

 collective heredity in its relation to Power in 

 civilization. 



I will not discuss at length here the first conclusion 

 to which researches of this kind are bound to carry 

 the observer at an early stage. I have referred to 

 it with some emphasis elsewhere. 1 In the face of 

 the evidence which is to hand on all sides it is im- 

 possible to avoid being convinced that none of the 

 leading races or nationalities which have ruled in the 

 past or which wield power on a large scale over other 

 peoples in the present have done so, or do so now, 

 because of any distinctive superior intellectual 

 faculties inborn in the ruling race. The ideas on 

 this subject which prevailed a few generations ago 

 will not survive the test of being brought into contact 

 with facts. 



Turning first to aboriginal races, Galton's hasty 

 generalizations about what he conceived to be the 

 greatly inferior mentality of aboriginal races like 

 the Damaras have become, when submitted to 



1 Social Evolution, ch. ix. 

 19 



