296 EUGENICS 
the State purify itself by aid of crude natural selection. 
We see pain and suffering only to relieve it, without 
inquiry as to the moral character of the sufferer, or as 
to his national or racial value. And this is right. No 
man is responsible for his own being ; and nature and 
nurture, over which he had no control, have made him 
the being he is, good or evil. But here science steps 
in, crying, “ Let the reprieve be accepted, but next 
remind the social conscience of its duty to the race. 
No nation can preserve its efficiency unless dominant 
fertility be associated with the mentally and physically 
fitter stocks. The reprieve is granted, but let there 
be no heritage if you would build up and preserve a 
virile and efficient people.’ 
Signs are not wanting that a few thoughtful people 
outside the ring of scientific enthusiasts are beginning 
to take a serious interest in the questions of race- 
improvement and national efficiency. But before any 
real progress is likely to be made, a knowledge of the 
fundamental facts of heredity must have become very 
much more widely distributed than is at present the 
case. Valuable work is being done in this direction 
by the Eugenics Education Society, the object of which 
is to popularize and carry into practical effect the idea 
of national Eugenics, as defined at the beginning of 
the present chapter. The intention of this society to 
make known generally the fact that biological principles 
apply to the production of human beings is one which 
cannot be too highly estimated. Since this is pre- 
cisely the object with which the present sketch has been 
added to a work otherwise almost purely theoretical 
