THE DIMINISHING BIRTH RATE 73 



lation where the birth rate is lowest. The social evil in its refined as 

 well as in its vulgar forms is nothing new. 



The economist further objects to the inference which the biologist 

 makes from the difference in fecundity between the higher and the 

 lower animals, or from the fact that wild animals become less fertile 

 in captivity. The argument from analogy can easily be pushed too far. 

 According to Malthus, the power of reproduction is less among bar- 

 barous than among civilized races. 1 



The economist also takes exception to the main contention of the 

 biologist. Without presuming to take issue with the biologist in his 

 own field, one may at least ask whether the decline of the birth rate 

 has not been too sudden and marked to account for mainly in terms of 

 a deficiency in the human organism to meet the demands made upon it. 

 In the evolution of the race it is probable that nothing has become more 

 firmly fixed than the power of reproduction because nothing is more 

 necessary to survival. In fact, the persistence of procreative power 

 is one of its noteworthy characteristics. This is so notorious among 

 many kinds of degenerates as to call for the new science of eugenics. 

 Apparently, the ability of the reproductive organs to take care of 

 themselves in any competitive contest with other demands upon the 

 human system is to be presumed. Hence, the theory that the rapid 

 pace of life has lessened the power of fecundity to anything like the ex- 

 tent that the birth rate has fallen seems improbable. 



Certain additional facts lend color to this position. If stress in 

 excess of the ability of the body to appropriate nourishment impover- 

 ishes the reproductive organs, why is fecundity among the insufficiently 

 nourished, clad and housed so great? In place of a low birth rate 

 among the poor, quite the reverse is true. Adam Smith's oft-quoted 

 remark that a half-starved Highland woman frequently bears more 

 than twenty children illustrates what is a matter of common observa- 

 tion. On the frontier, also, the strenuous and hard conditions of life 

 have been in no wise inconsistent with large families. Indeed, many 

 writers attribute the diminishing birth rate to over-nutrition rather 

 than to under-nutrition. 



Again, why should the activity of the brain rather than the activity 

 of other parts of the body interfere with the normal development and 

 nurture of the generative organs ? For what is more conducive to con- 

 tentment, happiness and health than an alert and active mind. A 

 writer in a recent number of The American Naturalist remarks : " An 

 impotence ascribed to psychical causes may rarely occur, but concern- 

 ing this factor, we have, obviously, little or no exact evidence." 2 In 

 point of fact, such meager statistics as exist upon the subject indicate 



1 Marshall, " Principles of Economics," fifth edition, Vol. I., p. 184. 

 2 Dr. Max Morse, "Sterility," Vol. XLIV., October, 1910, p. 624. 



