434 HEREDITY AND ENVIRONMENT 



end and the population again become station- 

 ary. Already the birth rate is decreasing more 

 rapidly than the death rate in all the western 

 countries of Europe and this movement must 

 ultimately extend to all parts of the world and 

 lead to a checking of the great increase in 

 population which has characterized the last two 

 hundred years. This approach to a stationary 

 population is both a normal and a desirable 

 thing, for no one could wish to see population 

 increase more rapidly than the supply of food 

 or other necessaries of life ; and of the two pos- 

 sible methods of checking population few 

 would hesitate to choose a decreasing birth rate 

 as preferable to an increasing death rate. 



It is not therefore the declining birth rate in 

 the general population that should cause 

 alarm but rather the declining birth rate in the 

 best elements of a population, while it con- 

 tinues to increase or at the least remains sta- 

 tionary among the poorer elements, and there 

 is abundant evidence that this is just what is 

 taking place. The descendants of the Puri- 

 tans and the Cavaliers who have raised the 

 cry for "few^r and better children" are already 



