INFLUENCE OF ORDER OF BIRTH, ETC. 319 
is that able sons are predominantly the offspring of fathers who 
were old at the time of their son’s birth or else that the more 
recent ancestors of the able sons were of advanced age. This 
general principle, according to Redfield, can only be accounted for 
on the ground that children inherit the mental power which their 
parents have acquired. Since older parents have reached a higher 
degree of intellectual development than younger parents their 
children, it is held, will consequently tend to be of superior 
mental ability. To breed a race of high intellectual power early 
marriages should be discouraged and children should be pro- 
created by parents who have attained their best physical and 
mental development. “Children of young parents,” we are told, 
“are lacking in physical stamina and mental power. They are 
reckless, careless, sometimes vicious and frequently drift into 
drunkenness and crime. From this class comes the principal 
part of our criminals, paupers and prostitutes.” 
It is quite evidently an exaggeration to say that the principal 
part of our criminals, paupers and prostitutes come from youth- 
ful parents. People who furnish our supply of these undesirables 
tend to reproduce early it is true; they also tend to keep on 
reproducing after the people of superior status have begun to 
limit their families. There is no adequate reason for concluding 
that youth of parents per se is responsible for the degenerate 
heredity of the offspring. These people marry early or reproduce 
young because they are of poor stock; they are not necessarily of 
poor stock because they marry young. 
We may make a parallel statement in regard to the parents of 
superior men. Redfield tells us that men of ability come from 
parents who are above the age of the parents of the rank and file 
of humanity. This is to a considerable extent true of the age 
at marriage of stocks from which great men are apt to arise. 
As a glance through such works as Galton’s Hereditary Genius, 
Ellis’ Study of British Genius, Galton and Schuster’s Noteworthy 
Families, or Cattell’s articles on the Families of American Men 
of Science ' will show, the parents of distinguished men belong 
1Sci. Mon, 4 and 5, 1917. 
