Darwinism and Race Progress

handicapped by surrounding conditions, lack of capital, education, or influence. We saw that recently more equal chances for success are being given to all, and with the result that

Capable Relat

nor suffer decrease; it will merely undergo a sifting process, and tend to find its place more and more in the ranks of the aristocracy. If, however, it should be found that the successful ones are less prolific, from one cause or another, then talent will tend to diminish, and the aristocracies will tend to dwindle by the side of the more prolific democracy, and will possibly e

Breeding from

that the average capacity of the race must therefore assuredly deteriorate. And whereas, in the animal world, those qualities which determine the success of an individual in the battle of life become stamped upon its progeny, our modern system entails just the reverse. In the animal world, fi

, for the sake of gifts and honours, to relinquish their obligation to the race of being the parents of many children. Such a plan must continually withdraw from the nation those qualities which are most admired, and which, it must be presumed, it is most desirable to preserve.[27] A n

le, and to develop to the utmost whatever of capacity, whatever of goodness, there may be present at any one time in the social community. Our sympathy for the downtrodden, and our efforts to assist those who are willing to do life's better work, are but expressions of the fact that we live and ha

cians, in cases where sincerity is undoubted, have aimed at the betterment of the individual, and the adjustment in the community of individual capacity to suitable occupation. Few have ever asked themselves the question, W

itious Men Marr

woman one of about his own age. The pair are married during nearly the whole of their child-bearing period, and have as many children as they, in the ordinary course of nature, can produce. Much the same sort of statement applies to the lower artisan, factory hand, etc. In these cases perfect accomplishment of the set routine of their especial work can be obtained at a very early age, and for the rest of life no further advance is made. The manual dexterity required in most of these occupations is indeed best acquired during youth, and at twenty or thereabouts the full standard of efficiency is reached, and full wages demanded in return. Need we wonder at the fertility of these marriages, or at the swarms of children seen in every street where the town labourers and lower artisans reside. Now, rightly or wrongly, the man who dresses fashionably, who drives a pen or serves behind a counter, is held of much more account than one who pursues the more manly occupations of tilling the ground or of laying drains. How this sentiment has arisen we need not discuss; there it is, and it has the effect of drawing from the agricultural and lower artisan classes the more ambitious and capable, and turning them into clerks and sho

by a more or less protracted acquaintance with the special business to which he may be devoted, an acquaintance which tends to be wider and of greater value as time goes on; he frequently has to wait for openings only obtainable on the decease of those with whom he is associated. The lawyer and doctor are only able to marry comparatively late in life owing again to the prolonged and special training required of them. The medical student must continue his studies for at leas

Persons among

ncreasing thereby the relative fertility of their class. While the success of a woman in the upper classes who has several daughters to dispose of is proverbially precarious, we read that in the East End of London every girl in the lowest classes can get married, and with hardly one exception does marry.[28] Those in the upper classes who marry at all do so, as alread

e, 1884–85. Occupations

24·06

hands 24

, tailors

ns 25·

rs 25·5

l clerks

s, shopmen

nd sons 2

d independent c

women. We should expect from common observation that the younger women would be more prolific, and this is borne out by exact statistical observation. Matthews Duncan[29] concludes that women who marry from twenty to tw

rriages are th

ce, we will suppose for the nonce that the labourer's wife A marries at twenty-three, and the lawyer's wife B marries at twenty-six, and that they have the same number of children, in each case four. In the case of A the population will double, say roughly, every twenty-seven years, and in the case of B ev

n. Years require

27

54

81

108

135

16

18

21

4 24

8 27

be fathers of smaller families than those who marry at twenty-five, even did they mate wi

t Mortality

ore fertile; they more frequently marry, and

r percentage of their off-spring. The mortality amongst the infants and childre

, it is not certain how far this is counterbalanced by the lower mor

estriction o

tent, been brought about by the wilful avoidance, on the part of the parents of the middle and upper classes, of the full duties of parenthood. It can no doubt be urged that whereas, in many instances, the care of one or two children can be undertaken in such a manner a

bly one of greatly increasing importance, by which the upper and middle classes are becoming, relatively speaking, sterile. It is probable, too, that this sterility will be m

ch and English Ma

lly among the children of a family; and in consequence of this, were there many children to a marriage, this property would be split up into smaller and smaller portions, insufficient at last to furnish the

lost by his sister's marriage. As a result of this artificial limitation of the family, the population of France remains stationary, there is no pressure of numbers, and by thrift and care the people are prosperous and happy. While, however, this may suit the convenience of individual French men and women, it is fatal for the future of the French race, who are becoming insignificant in numbers and influence as

e table for na

Births, Deaths. Year.

1000 Persons. Population. P

Dths. Mar.

·2 33·8 20·8 38,18

4 33·7 21·5 36,544,

·3 33·9 22·1 36,63

·8 33·3 20·5 37,36

·4 32·0 19·6 37,86

·5 30·7 19·0 38,32

·6 30·4 20·0 38,34

ve sterility that France has failed as a colonising power. The French have ever been full of enterprise, and have long desired to establish colonies, but they have in the main been ousted by the British. Colonisation to them has been an ambition, an idea, but not a necessity; to us the alternative has been overcrowding and misery on the one hand, and extensive emigration on the other. Can we wonder that British necessity has overmatched French vanity? One cannot read the acc

eople, have now far outnumbered their Gaelic neighbours, and have peopled the choicest portions of the inhabitab

of the Capables

t, if the present tendencies continue, we shall here also find that the ranks of those who possess the qualities suited to worldly success will increasingly be outnumbered by those more deficient in these qualities. If we tend to the p

ctions at Present

ca and Asia, has for some hundreds of years permitted certain European nations to increase their birth-rate above their death-rate, and we are so accustomed to such a condition of things that we do not realise that it is exceptional, and that countries, once they have reached a stable co

ts increase, has been enabled to possess itself of a large portion of the inhabitable world, and upon whose future increase will depend in great measure our faculty for keeping it; but we are called upon to see that this increase is derived from the best, and not from the worst, members of the community. It will be most disastrous not only to our Empire, whose strength depends in great measure upon the numbers of our citizens, but also to the quality of the race, if the more prudent and capable are bred out of and eliminated from the community. These, in the nature of things, will be the first to limit their fertility, no doubt to their individual advantage, but to the detriment of the race at large. The work on popul

TNO

ccessful are the best. This is, however, open

e of the People," p.

ty, and Sterility," seco

which the men marry have been omitted; their

y Dr. Ogle in the Journal of the Ro