The New Science — Eugenics or Race Hygiene. 7 



If his father could now speak he would be the first to acknowledge 

 that the change in thought to which allusion had been made, was 

 absolutely certain to come, whoever advocated it or did not 

 advocate it. It had been said that man was the culminating 

 point of this world process. That was true in a certain sense, but 

 it did not take a long walk through any slums to make them, at 

 any rate, hope for further progress. He thought also that science 

 told clearly that there was no physical bar to the progress of man 

 both in his mind and in his body. The word "culmination" had 

 a certain sinister sound about it. It was true that in the days of 

 the highest Greek achievements it might well be said that a 

 culminating point had been reached because civilisation for 

 many centuries went backwards, and historians told of many 

 great nations reaching a high position and then going backwards 

 for some reason that could hardly be known at present. They of 

 this race might be in the same predicament — if they were not 

 going backwards they might not be advancing as quickly as they 

 should. In dealing with this problem, eugenics was the science 

 that must be turned to. That science dealt with all those features 

 which determined whether the race was progressive or not. 

 Those who were pressing forward the demand for more study of 

 this subject might be called upon to prove three things. They 

 must prove that there was a serious problem demanding immediate 

 attention ; they must prove that the existing knowledge of scientific 

 facts indicated that great progress might be made in the race in 

 future if certain steps were now taken, and they must prove that 

 something should now be done. It would be noted that he made a 

 distinction between what could be done and what ought to be 

 done. The confusion of these questions had caused the science 

 of eugenics to lose very much. The question was what ought to be 

 done, because the difficulties they had to meet with were rather 

 more moral than intellectual. Enormous advances had been 

 made in medical treatment ; we had hospitals, asylums, a reformed 

 Poor-law, and reformed prisons. It would be seen that millions 



