318 HEREDITY AND SELECTION IN SOCIOLOGY 



■world, and the destruction of the opposite vices ensured also. 

 Conquest is the missionary of valour, and the hard impact of 

 military virtues beats meanness out of the world." ^ But it is 

 especially in the lower stages of civilisation that we observe the 

 value of war. The hunting and the pastoral races are compelled 

 periodically to go in search of new hunting-grounds or new 

 pastures for their flocks ; the extension of their territories, their 

 expansion, is a physiological necessity, whenever the old territory 

 becomes used up. In this early stage failure to expand means 

 swift and sure annihilation ; and, in order to expand, in order to 

 conquer new territories, it is necessary, above all things, that the 

 tribe should possess fitness, physical fitness, capacity for endurance, 

 courage, cimning, bodily strength. The individuals who are less 

 fit in these respects, who are weak or sickly, are ruthlessly exter- 

 minated. 



War under these conditions is obviously a selective factor of 

 great value and importance. But it is a remarkable fact that 

 the value of war as a factor of biological and social selection is in 

 inverse ratio to the degree of traditional culture attained by the 

 race. Whereas in the lower stages of civilisation war acts by 

 the elimination of the unfit ; in the higher stages, including our 

 own, it acts by the elimination of the fit. That this statement is 

 not paradoxical we shall shortly see. 



In coimtries in which compulsory military service prevails — 

 as is the case throughout the continent of Europe — ^those who 

 are allowed to serve, as a result of medical examination, are those 

 who are most fit in the biological sense of the word. Those who 

 sufier from any physical defect, whose eyesight is poor, who are 

 afflicted with shortsightedness or deafness, whose constitution is 

 weak and sickly, are all excluded from military service. Only 

 those who have attained a certain degree of physical robustness 

 and health are saddled with the burden of military service. 

 What is the result ? It is obvious that the man who has to serve 

 for two or three years in barracks, who is compulsorily withdrawn 

 1 W. Bagehot, Physics and Politics, pp. 74, 75. Kegan Paul. 



