It seems to me that the conflict of ideals is not as diver

gent as extremists on either side believe. All are agreed that we want the race maintained and that we want the children well trained, equipped with sound minds and bodies. If society will undertake the task large families may be desirable even for the poor. I assume that the unfit will be eliminated. If society is not ready to assume such a burden we have the option of continuing the present policy with its enormous burden of misery and neglect, or the attempt to reduce it by the limiting of the family.

Entirely aside from the question of reproduction there are many ways in which, it is claimed, society interferes with natural evolution. These must be considered. The interference with natural selection is specially stressed and the following claims are made:

1. It is alleged that human ingenuity has stopped man's physical evolution. Thus Drummond argued that there was no reason to anticipate further development of the hand because man's invention of tools had removed the necessity for better hands. In like fashion he claimed that the use of glasses had stopped the advance of the eyes, indeed he thought a marked retrogression could be seen because now man could make cameras, telescopes, miscroscopes, etc., which were better than natural eyes. Smell and hearing were also tending to disappear he believed.8

2. Surgical skill and medical knowledge by preserving the relatively unfit, that is the naturally poorer types, have stopped the struggle for existence and this is held to be very unfortunate. In part this argument may be considered as a corollary to the preceding paragraph, in part it covers new ground. The use of glasses, for illustration, makes it possible for many to remain in the ranks of teachers who would otherwise be forced into professions calling for less use of the eyes. But success in teaching turns upon many things besides eyes, and whether the exclusion of those with relatively poorer eyes would be socially advantageous or not, is not easily answered. A bit later we will consider the physical side of the problem. The preservation of the lives of types of women not fitted to become mothers has been mentioned already. In like fashion the cutting down of the death-rate from smallpox, malaria, typhoid, tuberculosis and yellow fever may be held to be unwise for it preserves the types susceptible to these diseases whereas the older conditions would have ultimately destroyed the susceptible types and the survivors would be free from their attacks. Again this entirely disregards the question of the social fitness of the susceptible individuals.

3. The attempt to prevent the formation of vicious habits by the prohibition of the sale of the agents used has been considered ill-advised. Thus G. A. Reid in "Alcoholism," an extreme but thought-provoking work, asserts that the older races of earth have, through long contact with alcohol, weeded out the types liable to alcoholism, and today need no artificial protection against it. The newer races, only recently possessed of alcohol in large quantities, are those that yield to its seductive influence to any degree. Therefore, says Reid, the Jews are practically free from alcoholism, while the Irish are often its slaves. The thing to do then, is to permit those who want to drink themselves to death to do so, and the sooner the better. We shall then have a race no longer in danger and thus in the long run will be better off. The warfare against alcohol, opium, peyote, coca-cola, hasheesh, tobacco, chloral, or whatnot is all wrong, say the advocates of what has been picturesquely called the "open-door-to-hell " policy, but nowhere has this policy found a large following in modern communities.

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4. War, as formerly conducted, that is as a direct struggle between individuals, has often been defended as a selective agency in that the weaker were destroyed. Modern warfare has become a contest of machines and destroys the strong as well as the weak. Solid shot and shrapnel make no distinction of persons. The diseases which have accompanied the wars of the nineteenth century have been far more deadly than the bullets and have in measure perhaps reintroduced the selective factor. But human skill will soon eliminate most of the incidental diseases. The contrast between a war conducted with due regard for modern science as by the Japanese, and one in which medical science was neglected (the Spanish-American War) or one antedating modern medicine (Civil War) is most striking as the following diagram reveals. It shows percentages of killed or dying from wounds; and from disease.

Opponents of all warfare point out that the terrific loss of life from whatever cause remove from the ranks of society, and of parents great numbers of young men in the prime of life who are the cream of the population from the physical standpoint because they have passed strict examinations which the weaklings cannot survive. They argue that Napoleon's campaigns reduced the average stature of the French and introduced a lot of degeneracy. The evidence on this point has seemed a bit less conclusive since August 1, 1914.

5. It is claimed that religious fanaticism leading to the destruction of many of the best men and women of the country, as in Spain during the Inquisition, has done incalculable harm to the people by changing the relative percentages of the higher and lower groups in the popula

RUSSO-JAPANESE WAR

CIVIL WAR

SPANISH-AMERICAN WAR

KILLED OR DIED OF WOUNDS,

DIED OF DISEASE

THE CAUSES OF DEATH IN THREE WARS

tion, and no one can doubt a certain justification for the claim. Just as the world had thought that such wholesale martyrdom was a thing of the past comes the biggest thing of the sort on record in the practical: annihilation of the Armenians by the Turks in 1915.

6. Modern humanitarian movements, the emphasis on the sacredness of life, the attempt to reform criminals, the care of the poor and afflicted, are often charged with being decidedly anti-social in their results. Why save the unfit? Why not let them perish and thus avoid not only the expense of caring for them but also avoid the taint they pass on to later generations?

7. The development of social castes, particularly when membership becomes a matter of birth-right, works harm in two ways. First, it checks and nullifies ambition on the part of gifted members of the lower groups. Second, it maintains in positions of power and responsibility those who are often unfit. The opponents of this argument maintain that in the long run the able members of the lower groups are taken into the higher and thus no real harm is done. As proof they cite the fact that the nobles in all countries are short lived. Thus, De Chateauneuf claims that in France such families seldom last over ten generations, or 300 years. Among 280 houses he found only 20 which pass the title uninterruptedly 9 or 10 times to the first born. Among the Nobles of the Robe the average family life was 230 years. The same general situation is true also of England and Germany. 10

8. That modern industry is accompanied by an enormous number of accidents is true. That it has produced new types of diseases due to the poisonous nature of substances used such as lead and sulphur, that work such as tunneling under rivers has given us the "caisson disease" is true. That sudden changes of temperature resulting from work in iron furnaces and the exposure to outer air has furnished favorable soil for tuberculosis and pneumonia admits of no doubt. It is alleged further that progressive degeneration of the working class is going on. As proof we are reminded that the English have had to lessen the army entrance requirements several times in the last century; that recruiting stations in the industrial districts of Pennsylvania at the time of the Spanish war were closed because the applicants could not pass the tests. These are unquestioned facts. If the inference is