INTRODUCTION 



With regard to the general aim and scope of this work, and to 

 sum up the latter concisely, we might say that Part I. aims 

 simply at an exposition of the facts of heredity and selection, 

 based more especially on the researches of Weismann ; Part II. 

 examines the question as to whether social polity at the present 

 moment tends, in the light of this knowledge, to what we have 

 called the biological and traditional progress of the race ; 

 Part III., after examining the system on which our social polity 

 is based (Liberahsm) and the system which it is proposed to 

 substitute for it (SociaKsm), deals with the possibility of founding 

 a social pohty capable of maintaining the efficiency of Western 

 society, alike from the biological and from the purely social 

 standpoint. 



It may be objected that Part I. deals too lengthily with 

 purely biological questions, and that it is somewhat technical 

 for a book purporting to come within the category of sociological 

 works. This objection seems to us unfounded, for surely a study 

 of social questions requires most emphatically a knowledge of 

 the laws of heredity and selection, considering that, as Herbert) 

 Spencer long ago pointed out, there exists no social phenomenon 

 which has not its roots in the phenomena of life itself. An 

 exposition of the role played by selection in the domain of organic 

 life is necessary in order to prepare the mind to understand the 

 importance of selection in the domain of social life. If we are 

 able to appreciate the omnipotence of Naturzilchtung in the life 



