468 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. I. No. 17. 



civilized countries is in fact deteriorating 

 because we are breeding from inferior tj'pes. 

 The increased knowledge of recent years is 

 being applied to free mankind from those 

 hardships and diseases which have beset 

 them. But although we may improve an 

 individual during his lifetime, both in phj's- 

 ical capacity and mental and moral power, 

 this improvement is not transmitted in any 

 appreciable degree to the offspring, who 

 have therefore to begin again where the 

 parents began. Men can leave their full 

 purses to their sons, but no legacies of 

 mental and moral improvement, or not 

 much. Therefore the action of healthy sur- 

 roundings will never produce a robust race 

 out of a feeble race, nor will the action of 

 the best educational system ever devised 

 develop a race of wise men out of a race of 

 fools. 



This leads our author to a dicsussion of 

 the question whether acquired characters 

 are inherited, or whether the reproductive 

 cells remain unaffected by local changes in 

 the body cells, and he sides with Darwin 

 and Weismann rather than with Lamarck 

 and Herbert Spencer. Eacial change is 

 brought about by selection, i. e., by the death 

 or nonproductiveness of certain sorts of in- 

 dividuals, so that the others alone remain ; 

 and if this remnant is organically superior, 

 then the next generation will be so. But 

 at present we are not perpetuating our best. 

 The gardener perfects his stock by selecting 

 seed only from the best ; and improved 

 breeds of cattle are produced in the same 

 way — not by any new method of ventila- 

 ting the cowshed, nor by any freshly discov- 

 ered patent fodder — yet we foolishly fancy 

 we can regenerate society by better food 

 and improved dwellings. We must resort 

 to selection rather. Preventive medicine 

 is saving us from small-pox, measles, ty- 

 phoid fever, etc.; but these diseases previ- 

 ously exercised a selective influence to carry 

 off the feeblest, who are now preserved to 



become race-producers. Leprosy also ex- 

 terminates the unhealthy, and must be 

 looked upon as a friend to humanity. The 

 germs of phthisis or scrofula are our racial- 

 friends. Sufferers from phtliisis are prone 

 to other diseases as well, and are unsuited 

 for the battle of life, yet because of a certain 

 attractiveness of personal appearance they 

 easily marrj^, and they leave a large pro- 

 gen3^ It follows that by exterminating the 

 bacillus of consumption and giving this deli- 

 cate and fragile type of persons an advan- 

 tage in the struggle of life we may imperil 

 the well-being of the future of the race. 

 Even drink may be looked upon as a selec- 

 tive agency, constantly thinning the ranks 

 of those who are weak enough by nature to ' 

 give way to it, and leaving unharmed those 

 with healthy tastes and sound moral con- 

 stitutions. Besides the diseased and the 

 drunken there are the incorrigibly criminal, 

 the class whose feet take by nature the 

 crooked path, and who at present are al- 

 lowed to transmit the taint and the ten- 

 dency. 



What is the remedy ? The argument might 

 seem to give a moral sanction to the broad- 

 cast scattering of the germs of disease, and 

 to the leaving of unlimited whisky on the 

 doorsteps of our weaker neighbors. But 

 no ! other ways are open to us. As regards 

 drink, indeed. Dr. Haycraft would not im- 

 pose any other restraining influence than a 

 man's own conscience and sense of self-re- 

 spect. But as regards persons tainted with 

 disease, he does not suggest anj' such merci- 

 less measure as a lethal chamber for them or 

 their offspring. He is content that preven- 

 tive medicine should continue its work, so 

 beneficent to the individual ; but he thinks 

 we ought to replace one selective agency by 

 another. There is already a widespread 

 feeling against the marriage of persons with 

 a distinct family history of insanity. He 

 would try to strengthen that feeling and 

 extend it to other forms of weakness and 



