1912] Ritter: The Marine Biological Station of San Diego 231 
The hypothesis that all phenomena of organic beings, inelud- 
ing those pertaining to the very highest aspects of human nature, 
are correlated uith chemico-physical phenomena, though not yet 
rigorously demonstrated in most of the subtler psychie and 
aesthetic provinces, is securely established over so wide a range 
of life phenomena and has thus far so well withstood rigorous 
efforts of disproof, that without doubt it has already greatly 
influenced general thought and attitude toward the deep prob- 
lems of human life, and will more and more influence them. In 
a matter so vital, and one about which general intelligence is 
bound to be so widely astir for such information as ean be had, 
it is of the greatest moment that information from the best 
sources should be readily available. 
The laws of heredity, particularly those discovered by Mendel, 
have been tested to such an extent as to make them of positive 
moment to human life. The eugenics idea, started in England 
by Francis Galton, aims at a practical application of the known 
principles of inheritance to the good of the human race. In view 
of the wide theoretic interest attached to these laws, and to the 
possible good that may come from their application to the propa- 
gation of man himself, the intelligent, thoughtful members of 
the community could undoubtedly be far better instructed than 
they are. Not only the possibilities but the lmitations of 
eugenics as a practical programme ought to be and might be 
presented in simple, readable language. 
That imperium in imperio of human concerns, the problem of 
the relation between the sexes is calling almost frantically to the 
biologist for help at certain points where it is coming to see 
dimly that he alone can help. A few investigators are doing 
splendid things in this way, though what has been done is but as 
molecule to mountain relative to what remains undone. 
Finally, without a doubt, innwmerable bald, unphilosophized 
facts of living nature that would entertain and instruct, and 
consequently keenly interest thousands upon thousands of gener- 
ally intelligent persons, are buried in the technical language of 
biological narration and description beyond the possibility of 
extraction for such purposes except at the hands of biologists 
themselves. 
