CROSSING AND CLOSE-INTERBREEDING. 201 



but by reason of the implications, it was fancied, 

 its determination carried with it. Those who were of 

 a " liberal" cast of thought, wished, by establishing the 

 negative, to prove that the inhibition of religion against 

 marriages of consanguinity, is wholly arbitrary, and 

 that it has no justification, upon natural grounds. The 

 other school are, for obvious reasons, bent- upon show- 

 ing that such intermarriages may not be contracted, 

 with impunity. 



On the one side, the almost universal aversion to 

 such marriages, is adduced. The lowest and most 

 degenerate tribes of men are pointed out as holding it 

 in the most abhorrence. Nor does their evidence end 

 here. The lower animals and plants contribute testi- 

 mony which is seemingly well nigh overwhelming. 

 The sterility of well-bred pigs, and of the high fancy 

 breeds of pigeons and of fowls, when interbred, are 

 noted ; aye, so peculiar are the evil results, in many in- 

 stances, that it is generally remarked, that the very im- 

 provements, which man effects in Pigs, Pigeons, Fowls, 

 and Plants, seem only to aggravate the evil results of 

 Interbreeding. _ The many instances, of Self-Impotent 

 Plants, also furnish evidence so pronounced, that it 

 would seem that the voice of cavil should be hushed. 



On the other hand, those who contend that evil 

 does not result from marriages of consanguinity, ad- 

 vance facts which are equally impossible to be gain- 

 1 said. They argue, that, although the aversion to in- 

 terbreeding is general, the fact that the prohibition 

 obtained with the least force among the most civilized 



nations of antiquity, and the fact that it is observed 

 18 



