CHAPTER XVI 
RETROSPECT AND PROSPECT 
“O, yet we trust that somehow good 
Will be the final goal of ill, 
To pangs of nature, sins of will, 
Defects of doubt, and taints of blood.” 
Tennyson, In Memoriam. 
“As an agency making for progress, conscious selection must re- 
place the blind forces of natural selection; and men must utilize all the 
knowledge acquired by studying the process of evolution in the past 
in order to promote moral and physical progress in the future. The 
nation which first takes this great work thoroughly in hand will surely 
not only win in all matters of international competition, but will be 
given a place of honour in the history of the world.”—Leonard Dar- 
win, Presidential Address before the First International Eugenics 
Congress. 
In the course of the discussions in the previous chapters there 
is one question which must have occurred to the reader on more 
than one occasion: What are the changes that are actually taking 
place in the inherited endowments of man? Can we prove by 
observation, statistics or otherwise that the race is either improve- 
ing or deteriorating? 
There is conclusive evidence that in many countries the present 
population differs in certain physical features from the population 
of one or more generations ago. One chief reason for this is that 
the ethnic composition of peoples is subject to comparatively 
rapid fluctuations. In several rapidly growing countries such as 
England, Germany, Austria and the United States, emigration 
immigration and differential fecundity have produced many 
changes in the last few decades. In most cases, the characteristics 
in which modifications are demonstrable are physical traits such 
as stature, cephalic index, and color of hair and eyes, which stand 
in a very doubtful relation to progressive or retrogressive devel- 
opment. 
364 
