CONCLUSION 323 
unimportant in comparison with the effect which would 
be produced by the selection of individuals who 
exhibit desirable qualities. The demand for a higher 
birth-rate ought to apply strictly to desirables. 
Instead of this the cry is for education and physical 
training, processes which can have no permanent 
beneficial effect upon the race. 
One writer who holds to some extent the attention 
of the intelligent public has recognised the true state 
of affairs—I mean Mr. Bernard Shaw. Unfortunately 
the public does not take Mr. Bernard Shaw seriously, 
wherein, when I recall Mr. Shaw’s published views on 
such topics as vivisection and the medical profession, 
the public has my sympathy. Nevertheless I know of 
no better expression of the moral to be drawn from 
the science of genetics than that which is embodied in 
the following passage : 
‘I do not know whether you have any illusions left 
on the subject of education, progress, and so forth. 
I have none. Any pamphleteer can show the way to 
better things, but when there is no will there is no way. 
My nurse was fond of remarking that you cannot make 
a silk purse out of a sow’s ear, and the more I see of 
the efforts of our churches and universities and literary 
sages to raise the mass above its own level, the more 
convinced I am that my nurse was right. Progress 
can do nothing but make the most of us all as we are, , 
and that most would clearly not be enough even if 
those who are already raised out of the lowest abysses 
would allow the others a chance. The bubble of 
heredity has been pricked, the certainty that acquire- 
ments are negligible as elements in practical heredity 
2I—2 
