GENETICS AND ETHICS 491 



ways discover great men. What does this 

 mean but that the men are ready formed and 

 that it requires only this extra stimulus to call 

 them forth? To most of us heredity has been 

 kind — kinder than we know. The possibilities 

 within us are great but they rarely come to full 

 epiphany. 



What is needed in education more than any- 

 thing else is some means or system which will 

 train the powers of self discovery and self 

 control. Easy lives and so-called "good en- 

 vironment" will not arouse the dormant 

 powers. It usually takes the stress and strain 

 of hard necessity to make us acquainted with 

 our hidden selves, to rouse the sleeping giant 

 within us. How often is it said that the 

 worthless sons of worthy parents are mys- 

 teries; with the best of heredity and environ- 

 ment they amount to nothing, whereas the sons 

 of poor and ignorant farmers, blacksmiths, 

 tanners and backwoodsmen, with few oppor- 

 tunities and with many hardships and disad- 

 vantages, become world figures. Probably the 

 inheritance in these last named cases was no 

 better than in the former, but the environment 



