{"collection":"philosophy-ethics","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_9887/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_9887","id":"gutenberg_9887","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/9887","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Essays, Letters & Speeches","Category: History - Modern (1750+)","Category: Philosophy & Ethics","Category: Sociology","Eugenics","Sex","War","World War I"],"text":"Produced by Eric Eldred, Beth Trapaga and PG Distributed Proofreaders\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nESSAYS IN WAR-TIME\n\nFURTHER STUDIES IN THE\nTASK OF SOCIAL HYGIENE\n\n\nBY HAVELOCK ELLIS\n\n\n\n\nCONTENTS\n\nI.     INTRODUCTION\nII.    EVOLUTION AND WAR\nIII.   WAR AND EUGENICS\nIV.    MORALITY IN WARFARE\nV.     IS WAR DIMINISHING\nVI.    WAR AND THE BIRTH-RATE\nVII.   WAR AND DEMOCRACY\nVIII.  FEMINISM AND MASCULINISM\nIX.    THE MENTAL DIFFERENCES OF MEN AND WOMEN\nX.     THE WHITE SLAVE CRUSADE\nXI.    THE CONQUEST OF VENEREAL DISEASE\nXII.   THE NATIONALISATION OF HEALTH\nXIII.  EUGENICS AND GENIUS\nXIV.   THE PRODUCTION OF ABILITY\nXV.    MARRIAGE AND DIVORCE\nXVI.   THE MEANING OF THE BIRTH-RATE\nXVII.  CIVILISATION AND THE BIRTH-RATE\nXVIII. BIRTH CONTROL\n       INDEX\n\n\n\n\nI\n\n\nINTRODUCTION\n\nFrom the point of view of literature, the Great War of to-day has\nbrought us into a new and closer sympathy with the England of the past.\nDr. Woods and Mr. Baltzly in their recent careful study of European\nWarfare, _Is War Diminishing?_ come to the conclusion that England\nduring the period of her great activity in the world has been \"fighting\nabout half the time.\" We had begun to look on war as belonging to the\npast and insensibly fallen into the view of Buckle that in England \"a\nlove of war is, as a national taste, utterly extinct.\" Now we have\nawakened to realise that we belong to a people who have been \"fighting\nabout half the time.\"\n\nThus it is, for instance, that we witness a revival of interest in\nWordsworth, not that Wordsworth, the high-priest of Nature among the\nsolitary Lakes, whom we have never forsaken, but the Wordsworth who\nsang exultantly of Carnage as God's Daughter. To-day we turn to the\nwar-like Wordsworth, the stern patriot hurling defiance at the enemies\nwho threatened our island fortress, as the authentic voice of England.\n\nBut this new sense of community with the past comes to us again and\nagain on every hand when to-day we look back to the records of the past.\nI chance to take down the _Epistles_ of Erasmus, and turn to the letters\nwhich the great Humanist of Rotterdam wrote from Cambridge and London\nfour hundred years ago when young Henry VIII had just suddenly (in 1514)\nplunged into war. One reads them to-day with vivid interest, for here\nin the supple and sensitive brain of the old scholar we see mirrored\nprecisely the same thoughts and the same problems which exercise the\nmore scholarly brains of to-day. Erasmus, as his Pan-German friends\nliked to remind him, was a sort of German, but he was, nevertheless,\nwhat we should now call a Pacifist. He can see nothing good in war and\nhe eloquently sets forth what he regards as its evils. It is interesting\nto observe, how, even in its small details as well as in its great\ncalamities, war brought precisely the same experiences four centuries\nago as to-day. Prices are rising every day, Erasmus declares, taxation\nhas become so heavy that no one can afford to be liberal, imports are\nhampered and wine is scarce, it is difficult even to get one's foreign\nletters. In fact the preparations of war are rapidly changing \"the\ngenius of the Island.\" Thereupon Erasmus launches into more general\nconsiderations on war. Even animals, he points out, do not fight, save\nrarely, and then with only those of other species, and, moreover, not,\nlike us, \"with machines upon which we expend the ingenuity of devils.\"\nIn every war also it is the non-combatants who suffer most, the people\nbuild cities and the folly of their rulers destroys them, the most\nrighteous, the most victorious war brings more evil than good, and even\nwhen a real issue is in dispute, it could better have been settled by\narbitration. The moral contagion of a war, moreover, lasts long after\nthe war is over, and Erasmus proceeds to express himself freely on the\ncrimes of fighters and fighting.\n\nErasmus was a cosmopolitan scholar who habitually dwelt in the world of\nthe spirit and in no wise expressed the general feelings either of his\nown time or ours. It is interesting to turn to a very ordinary, it may\nbe typical, Englishman who lived a century later, again in a period of\nwar and also of quite ordinary and but moderately glorious war. John\nRous, a Cambridge graduate of old Suffolk family, was in 1623 appointed\nincumbent of Santon Downham, then called a town, though now it has\ndwindled away almost to nothing. Here, or rather at Weeting or at\nBrandon where he lived, Rous began two years later, on the accession of\nCharles I, a private diary which was printed by the Camden Society sixty\nyears ago, and has probably remained unread ever since, unless, as in\nthe present case, by some person of antiquarian tastes interested in\nthis remote corner of East Anglia. But to-day one detects a new streak\nof interest in this ancient series of miscellaneous entries where we\nfind that war brought to the front the very same problems which confront\nus to-day.\n\nSanton Downham lies in a remote and desolate and salubrious region, not\nwithout its attractions to-day, nor, for all its isolation, devoid of\nancient and modern associations. For here in Weeting parish we have the\ngreat prehistoric centre of the flint implement industry, still lingering\non at Brandon after untold ages, a shrine of the archaeologist. And here\nalso, or at all events near by, at Lackenheath, doubtless a shrine also\nfor all men in khaki, the villager proudly points out the unpretentious\nlittle house which is the ancestral home of the Kitcheners, who lie in\norderly rank in the churchyard beside the old church notable for its\nrarely quaint mediaeval carvings.\n\nRous was an ordinary respectable type of country parson, a solid\nEnglishman, cautious and temperate in his opinions, even in the privacy\nof his diary, something of a country gentleman as well as a scholar, and\ninterested in everything that went on, in the season's crops, in the\nrising price of produce, in the execution of a youth for burglary or the\nburning of a woman for murdering her husband. He frequently refers to\nthe outbreak of plague in various parts of the country, and notes, for\ninstance, that \"Cambridge is wondrously reformed since the plague there;\nscholars frequent not the streets and taverns as before; but,\" he adds\nlater on better information, \"do worse.\" And at the same time he is full\nof interest in the small incidents of Nature around him, and notes, for\ninstance, how a crow had built a nest and laid an egg in the poke of the\ntopsail of the windmill.\n\nBut Rous's Diary is not concerned only with matters of local interest.\nAll the rumours of the world reached the Vicar of Downham and were by\nhim faithfully set down from day to day. Europe was seething with war;\nthese were the days of that famous Thirty Years' War of which we have so\noften heard of late, and from time to time England was joining in the\ngeneral disturbance, whether in France, Spain, or the Netherlands. As\nusual the English attack was mostly from the basis of the Fleet, and\nnever before, Rous notes, had England possessed so great and powerful a\nfleet. Soon after the Diary begins the English Expedition to Rochelle\ntook place, and a version of its history is here embodied. Rous was kept\nin touch with the outside world not only by the proclamations constantly\nset up at Thetford on the corner post of the Bell Inn--still the centre\nof that ancient town--but by as numerous and as varied a crop of reports\nas we find floating among us to-day, often indeed of very similar\ncharacter. The vicar sets them down, not committing himself to belief\nbut with a patient confidence that \"time may tell us what we may safely\nthink.\" In the meanwhile measures with which we are familiar to-day were\nactively in progress: recruits or \"voluntaries\" were being \"gathered up\nby the drum,\" many soldiers, mostly Irish, were billeted, sometimes not\nwithout friction, all over East Anglia, the coasts were being fortified,\nthe price of corn was rising, and even the problem of international\nexchange is discussed with precise data by Rous.\n\nOn one occasion, in 1627, Rous reports a discussion concerning the\nRochelle Expedition which exactly counterparts our experience to-day. He\nwas at Brandon with two gentlemen named Paine and Howlet, when the\nformer began to criticise the management of the expedition, disputing\nthe possibility of its success and then \"fell in general to speak\ndistrustfully of the voyage, and then of our war with France, which he\nwould make our King the cause of\"; and so went on to topics of old\npopular discontent, of the great cost, the hazard to ships, etc. Rous,\nlike a good patriot, thought it \"foul for any man to lay the blame upon\nour own King and State. I told them I would always speak the best of\nwhat our King and State did, and think the best too, till I had good\ngrounds.\" And then in his Diary he comments that he saw hereby, what he\nhad often seen before, that men be disposed to speak the worst of State\nbusiness, as though it were always being mismanaged, and so nourish a\ndiscontent which is itself a worse mischief and can only give joy to\nfalse hearts. That is a reflection which comes home to us to-day when we\nfind the descendants of Mr. Paine following so vigorously the example\nwhich the parson of Downham reprobated.\n\nThat little incident at Brandon, however, and indeed the whole picture\nof the ordinary English life of his time which Rous sets forth, suggest\na wider reflection. We realise what has always been the English temper.\nIt is the temper of a vigorous, independent, opinionated, free-spoken\nyet sometimes suspicious people among whom every individual feels in\nhimself the impulse to rule. It is also the temper of a people always\nprepared in the face of danger to subordinate these native impulses. The\none tendency and the other opposing tendency are alike based on the\nhistory and traditions of the race. Fifteen centuries ago, Sidonius\nApollinaris gazed inquisitively at the Saxon barbarians, most ferocious\nof all foes, who came to Aquitania, with faces daubed with blue paint\nand hair pushed back over their foreheads; shy and awkward among the\ncourtiers, free and turbulent when back again in their ships, they were\nall teaching and learning at once, and counted even shipwreck as good\ntraining. One would think, the Bishop remarks, that each oarsman was\nhimself the arch-pirate.[1] These were the men who so largely went to\nthe making of the \"Anglo-Saxon,\" and Sidonius might doubtless still\nutter the same comment could he observe their descendants in England\nto-day. Every Englishman believes in his heart, however modestly he may\nconceal the conviction, that he could himself organise as large an army as\nKitchener and organise it better. But there is not only the instinct to\norder and to teach but also to learn and to obey. For every Englishman\nis the descendant of sailors, and even this island of Britain seemed to\nmen of old like a great ship anchored in the sea. Nothing can overcome\nthe impulse of the sailor to stand by his post at the moment of danger,\nand to play his sailorly part, whatever his individual convictions may\nbe concerning the expedition to Rochelle or the expedition to the\nDardanelles, or even concerning his right to play no part at all. That\nhas ever been the Englishman's impulse in the hour of peril of his island\nShip of State, as to-day we see illustrated in an almost miraculous\ndegree. It is the saving grace of an obstinately independent and\nindisciplinable people.\n\nYet let us not forget that this same English temper is shown not only in\nwarfare, not only in adventure in the physical world, but also in the\ngreater, and--may we not say?--equally arduous tasks of peace. For to\nbuild up is even yet more difficult than to pull down, to create new\nlife a still more difficult and complex task than to destroy it. Our\nEnglish habits of restless adventure, of latent revolt subdued to the\nends of law and order, of uncontrollable freedom and independence, are\neven more fruitful here, in the organisation of the progressive tasks of\nlife, than they are in the organisation of the tasks of war.\n\nThat is the spirit in which these essays have been written by an\nEnglishman of English stock in the narrowest sense, whose national and\nfamily instincts of independence and warfare have been transmuted into a\npreoccupation with the more constructive tasks of life. It is a spirit\nwhich may give to these little essays--mostly produced while war was in\nprogress--a certain unity which was not designed when I wrote them.\n\n\n[1] O'Dalton, _Letters of Sidonius_, Vol. II., p. 149.\n\n\n\n\nII\n\n\nEVOLUTION AND WAR\n\nThe Great War of to-day has rendered acute the question of the place of\nwarfare in Nature and the effect of war on the human race. These have\nlong been debated problems concerning which there is no complete\nagreement. But until we make up our minds on these fundamental questions\nwe can gain no solid ground from which to face serenely, or at all\nevents firmly, the crisis through which mankind is now passing.\n\nIt has been widely held that war has played an essential part in the\nevolutionary struggle for survival among our animal ancestors, that war\nhas been a factor of the first importance in the social development of\nprimitive human races, and that war always will be an essential method\nof preserving the human virtues even in the highest civilisation. It\nmust be observed that these are three separate and quite distinct\npropositions. It is possible to accept one, or even two, of them without\naffirming them all. If we wish to clear our minds of confusion on this\nmatter, so vital to our civilisation, we must face each of the questions\nby itself.\n\nIt has sometimes been maintained--never more energetically than to-day,\nespecially among the nations which most eagerly entered the present\nconflict--that war is a biological necessity. War, we are told, is\na manifestation of the \"Struggle for Life\"; it is the inevitable\napplication to mankind of the Darwinian \"law\" of natural selection.\nThere are, however, two capital and final objections to this view. On\nthe one hand it is not supported by anything that Darwin himself said,\nand on the other hand it is denied as a fact by those authorities on\nnatural history who speak with most knowledge. That Darwin regarded war\nas an insignificant or even non-existent part of natural selection must\nbe clear to all who have read his books. He was careful to state that he\nused the term \"struggle for existence\" in a \"metaphorical sense,\" and\nthe dominant factors in the struggle for existence, as Darwin understood\nit, were natural suitability to the organic and inorganic environment\nand the capacity for adaptation to circumstances; one species flourishes\nwhile a less efficient species living alongside it languishes, yet they\nmay never come in actual contact and there is nothing in the least\napproaching human warfare. The conditions much more resemble what, among\nourselves, we may see in business, where the better equipped species,\nthat is to say, the big capitalist, flourishes, while the less well\nequipped species, the small capitalist, succumbs. Mr. Chalmers Mitchell,\nSecretary of the London Zoological Society and familiar with the habits\nof animals, has lately emphasised the contention of Darwin and shown\nthat even the most widely current notions of the extermination of one\nspecies by another have no foundation in fact.[1] Thus the thylacine or\nTasmanian wolf, the fiercest of the marsupials, has been entirely driven\nout of Australia and its place taken by a later and higher animal, of\nthe dog family, the dingo. But there is not the slightest reason to\nbelieve that the dingo ever made war on the thylacine. If there was any\nstruggle at all it was a common struggle against the environment, in\nwhich the dingo, by superior intelligence in finding food and rearing\nyoung, and by greater resisting power to climate and disease, was able\nto succeed where the thylacine failed. Again, the supposed war of\nextermination waged in Europe by the brown rat against the black rat is\n(as Chalmers Mitchell points out) pure fiction. In England, where this\nwar is said to have been ferociously waged, both rats exist and\nflourish, and under conditions which do not usually even bring them into\ncompetition with each other. The black rat (_Mus rattus_) is smaller\nthan the other, but more active and a better climber; he is the rat of\nthe barn and the granary. The brown or Norway rat (_Mus decumanus_) is\nlarger but less active, a burrower rather than a climber, and though\nboth rats are omnivorous the brown rat is more especially a scavenger;\nhe is the rat of sewers and drains. The black rat came to Northern\nEurope first--both of them probably being Asiatic animals--and has no\ndoubt been to some extent replaced by the brown rat, who has been\nspecially favoured by the modern extension of drains and sewers, which\nexactly suit his peculiar tastes. But each flourishes in his own\nenvironment; neither of them is adapted to the other's environment;\nthere is no war between them, nor any occasion for war, for they do not\nreally come into competition with each other. The cockroaches, or\n\"blackbeetles,\" furnish another example. These pests are comparatively\nmodern and their great migrations in recent times are largely due to\nthe activity of human commerce. There are three main species of\ncockroach--the Oriental, the American, and the German (or Croton\nbug)--and they flourish near together in many countries, though not with\nequal success, for while in England the Oriental is most prosperous, in\nAmerica the German cockroach is most abundant. They are seldom found in\nactual association, each is best adapted to a particular environment;\nthere is no reason to suppose that they fight. It is so throughout\nNature. Animals may utilise other species as food; but that is true of\neven, the most peaceable and civilised human races. The struggle for\nexistence means that one species is more favoured by circumstances than\nanother species; there is not the remotest resemblance anywhere to human\nwarfare.\n\nWe may pass on to the second claim for war: that it is an essential\nfactor in the social development of primitive human races. War has no\npart, though competition has a very large part, in what we call\n\"Nature.\" But, when we come to primitive man the conditions are somewhat\nchanged; men, unlike the lower animals, are able to form large\ncommunities--\"tribes,\" as we call them--with common interests, and two\nprimitive tribes can come into a competition which is acute to the point\nof warfare because being of the same, and not of two different, species,\nthe conditions of life which they both demand are identical; they are\nimpelled to fight for the possession of these conditions as animals of\ndifferent species are not impelled to fight. We are often told that\nanimals are more \"moral\" than human beings, and it is largely to the\nfact that, except under the immediate stress of hunger, they are better\nable to live in peace with each other, that the greater morality of\nanimals is due. Yet, we have to recognise, this mischievous tendency to\nwarfare, so often (though by no means always, and in the earliest stages\nprobably never) found in primitive man, was bound up with his superior\nand progressive qualities. His intelligence, his quickness of sense, his\nmuscular skill, his courage and endurance, his aptitude for discipline\nand for organisation--all of them qualities on which civilisation is\nbased--were fostered by warfare. With warfare in primitive life was\nclosely associated the still more fundamental art, older than humanity,\nof dancing. The dance was the training school for all the activities\nwhich man developed in a supreme degree--for love, for religion, for\nart, for organised labour--and in primitive days dancing was the chief\nmilitary school, a perpetual exercise in mimic warfare during times of\npeace, and in times of war the most powerful stimulus to military\nprowess by the excitement it aroused. Not only was war a formative and\ndevelopmental social force of the first importance among early men, but\nit was comparatively free from the disadvantages which warfare later on\ndeveloped; the hardness of their life and the obtuseness of their\nsensibility reduced to a minimum the bad results of wounds and shocks,\nwhile their warfare, being free from the awful devices due to the\ndevilry of modern man, was comparatively innocuous; even if very\ndestructive, its destruction was necessarily limited by the fact that\nthose accumulated treasures of the past which largely make civilisation\nhad not come into existence. We may admire the beautiful humanity, the\nfinely developed social organisation, and the skill in the arts attained\nby such people as the Eskimo tribes, which know nothing of war, but we\nmust also recognise that warfare among primitive peoples has often been\na progressive and developmental force of the first importance, creating\nvirtues apt for use in quite other than military spheres.[2]\n\nThe case is altered when we turn from savagery to civilisation. The new\nand more complex social order while, on the one hand, it presents\nsubstitutes for war in so far as war is a source of virtues, on the\nother hand, renders war a much more dangerous performance both to the\nindividual and to the community, becoming indeed, progressively more\ndangerous to both, until it reaches such a climax of world-wide injury\nas we witness to-day. The claim made in primitive societies that warfare\nis necessary to the maintenance of virility and courage, a claim so\nfully admitted that only the youth furnished with trophies of heads or\nscalps can hope to become an accepted lover, is out of date in\ncivilisation. For under civilised conditions there are hundreds of\navocations which furnish exactly the same conditions as warfare for the\ncultivation of all the manly virtues of enterprise and courage and\nendurance, physical or moral. Not only are these new avocations equally\npotent for the cultivation of virility, but far more useful for the\nsocial ends of civilisation. For these ends warfare is altogether less\nadapted than it is for the social ends of savagery. It is much less\ncongenial to the tastes and aptitudes of the individual, while at the\nsame time it is incomparably more injurious to Society. In savagery\nlittle is risked by war, for the precious heirlooms of humanity have not\nyet been created, and war can destroy nothing which cannot easily be\nremade by the people who first made it. But civilisation possesses--and\nin that possession, indeed, civilisation largely consists--the precious\ntraditions of past ages that can never live again, embodied in part in\nexquisite productions of varied beauty which are a continual joy and\ninspiration to mankind, and in part in slowly evolved habits and laws of\nsocial amenity, and reasonable freedom, and mutual independence, which\nunder civilised conditions war, whether between nations or between\nclasses, tends to destroy, and in so destroying to inflict a permanent\nloss in the material heirlooms of Mankind and a serious injury to the\nspiritual traditions of civilisation.\n\nIt is possible to go further and to declare that warfare is in\ncontradiction with the whole of the influences which build up and\norganise civilisation. A tribe is a small but very closely knit unity,\nso closely knit that the individual is entirely subordinated to the\nwhole and has little independence of action or even of thought. The\ntendency of civilisation is to create webs of social organisation which\ngrow ever larger, but at the same time looser, so that the individual\ngains a continually growing freedom and independence. The tribe becomes\nmerged in the nation, and beyond even this great unit, bonds of\ninternational relationship are progressively formed. War, which at first\nfavoured this movement, becomes an ever greater impediment to its\nultimate progress. This is recognised at the threshold of civilisation,\nand the large community, or nation, abolishes warfare between the units\nof which it is composed by the device of establishing law courts to\ndispense impartial justice. As soon as civilised society realised that\nit was necessary to forbid two persons to settle their disputes by\nindividual fighting, or by initiating blood-feuds, or by arming friends\nand followers, setting up courts of justice for the peaceable settlement\nof disputes, the death-blow of all war was struck. For all the arguments\nthat proved strong enough to condemn war between two individuals are\ninfinitely stronger to condemn war between the populations of two-thirds\nof the earth. But, while it was a comparatively easy task for a State to\nabolish war and impose peace within its own boundaries--and nearly all\nover Europe the process was begun and for the most part ended centuries\nago--it is a vastly more difficult task to abolish war and impose peace\nbetween powerful States. Yet at the point at which we stand to-day\ncivilisation can make no further progress until this is done. Solitary\nthinkers, like the Abbe de Saint-Pierre, and even great practical\nstatesmen like Sully and Penn, have from time to time realised this\nfact during the past four centuries, and attempted to convert it into\nactuality. But it cannot be done until the great democracies are won\nover to a conviction of its inevitable necessity. We need an\ninternational organisation of law courts which shall dispense justice as\nbetween nation and nation in the same way as the existing law courts of\nall civilised countries now dispense justice as between man and man; and\nwe further need, behind this international organisation of justice, an\ninternational organisation of police strong enough to carry out the\ndecisions of these courts, not to exercise tyranny but to ensure to\nevery nation, even the smallest, that measure of reasonable freedom and\nsecurity to go about its own business which every civilised nation now,\nin some small degree at all events, already ensures to the humblest of\nits individual citizens. The task may take centuries to complete, but\nthere is no more urgent task before mankind to-day.[3]\n\nThese considerations are very elementary, and a year or two ago they\nmight have seemed to many--though not to all of us--merely academic,\nchiefly suitable to put before schoolchildren. But now they have ceased\nto be merely academic; they have indeed acquired a vital actuality\nalmost agonisingly intense. For one realises to-day that the\nconsiderations here set forth, widely accepted as they are, yet are not\ngenerally accepted by the rulers and leaders of the greatest and\nforemost nations of the world. Thus Germany, in its present Prussianised\nstate, through the mouths as well as through the actions of those rulers\nand leaders, denies most of the conclusions here set forth. In Germany\nit is a commonplace to declare that war is the law of Nature, that the\n\"struggle for existence\" means the arbitration of warfare, that it is by\nwar that all evolution proceeds, that not only in savagery but in the\nhighest civilisation the same rule holds good, that human war is the\nsource of all virtues, the divinely inspired method of regenerating and\npurifying mankind, and every war may properly be regarded as a holy war.\nThese beliefs have been implicit in the Prussian spirit ever since the\nGoths and Vandals issued from the forests of the Vistula in the dawn of\nEuropean history. But they have now become a sort of religious dogma,\npreached from pulpits, taught in Universities, acted out by statesmen.\nFrom this Prussian point of view, whether right or wrong, civilisation,\nas it has hitherto been understood in the world, is of little\nconsequence compared to German militaristic Kultur. Therefore the German\nquite logically regards the Russians as barbarians, and the French as\ndecadents, and the English as contemptibly negligible, although the\nRussians, however yet dominated by a military bureaucracy (moulded by\nTeutonic influences, as some maliciously point out), are the most humane\npeople of Europe, and the French the natural leaders of civilisation as\ncommonly understood, and the English, however much they may rely on\namateurish methods of organisation by emergency, have scattered the\nseeds of progress over a large part of the earth's surface. It is\nequally logical that the Germans should feel peculiar admiration and\nsympathy for the Turks, and find in Turkey, a State founded on military\nideals, their own ally in the present war. That war, from our present\npoint of view, is a war of States which use military methods for special\nends (often indeed ends that have been thoroughly evil) against a State\nwhich still cherishes the primitive ideal of warfare as an end in\nitself. And while such a State must enjoy immense advantages in the\nstruggle, it is difficult, when we survey the whole course of human\ndevelopment, to believe that there can be any doubt about the final\nissue.\n\nFor one who writes as an Englishman, it may be necessary to point out\nclearly that that final issue by no means involves the destruction, or\neven the subjugation, of Germany. It is indeed an almost pathetic fact\nthat Germany, which idealises warfare, stands to gain more than any\ncountry by an assured rule of international peace which would save her\nfrom warfare. Placed in a position which renders militaristic\norganisation indispensable, the Germans are more highly endowed than\nalmost any people with the high qualities of intelligence, of\nreceptiveness, of adaptability, of thoroughness, of capacity for\norganisation, which ensure success in the arts and sciences of peace, in\nthe whole work of civilisation. This is amply demonstrated by the\nimmense progress and the manifold achievements of Germany during forty\nyears of peace, which have enabled her to establish a prosperity and a\ngood name in the world which are now both in peril. Germany must be\nbuilt up again, and the interests of civilisation itself, which Germany\nhas trampled under foot, demand that Germany shall be built up again,\nunder conditions, let us hope, which will render her old ideals useless\nand out of date. We shall then be able to assert as the mere truisms\nthey are, and not as a defiance flung in the face of one of the world's\ngreatest nations, the elementary propositions I have here set forth. War\nis not a permanent factor of national evolution, but for the most part\nhas no place in Nature at all; it has played a part in the early\ndevelopment of primitive human society, but, as savagery passes into\ncivilisation, its beneficial effects are lost, and, on the highest\nstages of human progress, mankind once more tends to be enfolded, this\ntime consciously and deliberately, in the general harmony of Nature.\n\n\n[1] P. Chalmers Mitchell, _Evolution and the War_, 1915.\n\n[2] On the advantages of war in primitive society, see W. MacDougal's\n_Social Psychology_, Ch. XI.\n\n[3] It is doubtless a task beset by difficulties, some of which are set\nforth, in no hostile spirit, by Lord Cromer, \"Thinking Internationally,\"\n_Nineteenth Century_, July, 1916; but the statement of most of these\ndifficulties is enough to suggest the solution.\n\n\n\n\nIII\n\n\nWAR AND EUGENICS\n\nIn dealing with war it is not enough to discuss the place of warfare in\nNature or its effects on primitive peoples. Even if we decide that the\ngeneral tendency of civilisation is unfavourable to war we have scarcely\nsettled matters. It is necessary to push the question further home.\nPrimitive warfare among savages, when it fails to kill, may be a\nstimulating and invigorating exercise, simply a more dangerous form of\ndancing. But civilised warfare is a different kind of thing, to a very\nlimited extent depending on, or encouraging, the prowess of the\nindividual fighting men, and to be judged by other standards. _What\nprecisely is the measurable effect of war, if any, on the civilised\nhuman breed?_ If we want to know what to do about war in the future,\nthat is the question we have to answer.\n\n\"Wars are not paid for in war-time,\" said Benjamin Franklin, \"the bill\ncomes later.\" Franklin, who was a pioneer in many so fields, seems to\nhave been a pioneer in eugenics also by arguing that a standing army\ndiminishes the size and breed of the human species. He had, however, no\ndefinite facts wherewith to demonstrate conclusively that proposition.\nEven to-day, it cannot be said that there is complete agreement among\nbiologists as to the effect of war on the race. Thus we find a\ndistinguished American zoologist, Chancellor Starr Jordan, constantly\nproclaiming that the effect of war in reversing selection is a great\novershadowing truth of history; warlike nations, he declares, become\neffeminate, while peaceful nations generate a fiercely militant\nspirit.[1] Another distinguished American scientist, Professor Ripley,\nin his great work, _The Races of Europe_, likewise concludes that\n\"standing armies tend to overload succeeding generations with inferior\ntypes of men.\" A cautious English biologist, Professor J. Arthur\nThomson, is equally decided in this opinion, and in his recent Galton\nLecture[2] sets forth the view that the influence of war on the race,\nboth directly and indirectly, is injurious; he admits that there may\nbe beneficial as well as deteriorative influences, but the former\nmerely affect the moral atmosphere, not the hereditary germ plasm;\nbiologically, war means wastage and a reversal of rational selection,\nsince it prunes off a disproportionally large number of those whom the\nrace can least afford to lose. On the other hand, another biologist, Dr.\nChalmers Mitchell, equally opposed to war, cannot feel certain that the\ntotal effect of even a great modern war is to deteriorate the stock,\nwhile in Germany, as we know, it is the generally current opinion,\nscientific and unscientific, equally among philosophers, militarists,\nand journalists, that not only is war \"a biological necessity,\" but that\nit is peace, and not war, which effeminates and degenerates a nation. In\nGermany, indeed, this doctrine is so generally accepted that it is not\nregarded as a scientific thesis to be proved, but as a religious dogma\nto be preached. It is evident that we cannot decide this question, so\nvital to human progress, except on a foundation of cold and hard fact.\n\nWhatever may be the result of war on the quality of the breed, there can\nbe little doubt of its temporary effect on the quantity. The reaction\nafter war may create a stimulating influence on the birth-rate, leading\nto a more or less satisfactory recovery, but it seems clear that the\ndrafting away of a large proportion of the manhood of a nation\nnecessarily diminishes births. At the present time English Schools are\nsending out an unusually small number of pupils into life, and this is\ndirectly due to the South-African War fifteen years ago. Still more\nobvious is the direct effect of war, apart from diminishing the number\nof births, in actually pouring out the blood of the young manhood of\nthe race. In the very earliest stage of primitive humanity it seems\nprobable that man was as untouched by warfare as his animal ancestors,\nand it is satisfactory to think that war had no part in the first birth\nof man into the world. Even the long Early Stone Age has left no\ndistinguishable sign of the existence of warfare.[3] It was not until\nthe transition to the Late Stone Age, the age of polished flint\nimplements, that we discern evidences of the homicidal attacks of man\non man. Even then we are concerned more with quarrels than with\nbattles, for one of the earliest cases of wounding known in human\nrecords, is that of a pregnant young woman found in the Cro-magnon Cave\nwhose skull had been cut open by a flint several weeks before death, an\nindication that she had been cared for and nursed. But, again at the\nbeginning of the New Stone Age, in the caverns of the Beaumes-Chaudes\npeople, who still used implements of the Old Stone type, we find skulls\nin which are weapons of the New Stone type. Evidently these people had\ncome in contact with a more \"civilised\" race which had discovered war.\nYet the old pacific race still lingered on, as in the Belgian people\nof the Furfooz type who occupied themselves mainly with hunting and\nfishing, and have their modern representatives, if not their actual\ndescendants, in the peaceful Lapps and Eskimo.[4]\n\nIt was thus at a late stage of human history, though still so primitive\nas to be prehistoric, that organised warfare developed. At the dawn of\nhistory war abounded. The earliest literature of the Aryans--whether\nGreeks, Germans, or Hindus--is nothing but a record of systematic\nmassacres, and the early history of the Hebrews, leaders in the world's\nreligion and morality, is complacently bloodthirsty. Lapouge considers\nthat in modern times, though wars are fewer in number, the total number\nof victims is still about the same, so that the stream of bloodshed\nthroughout the ages remains unaffected. He attempted to estimate the\nvictims of war for each civilised country during half a century, and\nfound that the total amounted to nine and a half millions, while, by\nincluding the Napoleonic and other wars of the beginning of the\nnineteenth century, he considered that that total would be doubled. Put\nin another form, Lapouge says, the wars of a century spill 120,000,000\ngallons of blood, enough to fill three million forty-gallon casks, or\nto create a perpetual fountain sending up a jet of 150 gallons per hour,\na fountain which has been flowing unceasingly ever since the dawn of\nhistory. It is to be noted, also, that those slain on the battlefield by\nno means represent the total victims of a war, but only about half of\nthem; more than half of those who, from one cause or another, perished\nin the Franco-Prussian war, it is said, were not belligerents. Lapouge\nwrote some ten years ago and considered that the victims of war, though\nremaining about absolutely the same in number through the ages, were\nbecoming relatively fewer. The Great War of to-day would perhaps have\ndisturbed his calculations, unless we may assume that it will be\nfollowed by a tremendous reaction against war. For when the war had\nlasted only nine months, it was estimated that if it should continue at\nthe present rate (and as a matter of fact its scale has been much\nenlarged) for another twelve months, the total loss to Europe in lives\ndestroyed or maimed would be ten millions, about equal to five-sixths of\nthe whole young manhood of the German Empire, and nearly the same number\nof victims as Lapouge reckoned as the normal war toll of a whole\nhalf-century of European \"civilisation.\" It is scarcely necessary to add\nthat all these bald estimates of the number of direct victims to war\ngive no clue to the moral and material damage--apart from all question\nof injury to the race--done by the sudden or slow destruction of so\nlarge a proportion of the young manhood of the world, the ever widening\ncircles of anguish and misery and destitution which every fatal bullet\nimposes on humanity, for it is probable that for every ten million\nsoldiers who fall on the field, fifty million other persons at home are\nplunged into grief or poverty, or some form of life-diminishing trouble.\n\nThe foregoing considerations have not, however, brought us strictly\nwithin the field of eugenics. They indicate the great extent to which\nwar affects the human breed, but they do not show that war affects the\nquality of the breed, and until that is shown the eugenist remains\nundisturbed.\n\nThere are various circumstances which, at the outset, and even in the\nabsence of experimental verification, make it difficult, or impossible,\nthat even the bare mortality of war (for the eugenical bearings of\nwar are not confined to its mortality) should leave the eugenist\nindifferent. For war never hits men at random. It only hits a carefully\nselected percentage of \"fit\" men. It tends, in other words, to strike\nout, temporarily, or in a fatal event, permanently, from the class of\nfathers, precisely that percentage of the population which the eugenist\nwishes to see in that class. This is equally the case in countries with\nsome form of compulsory service, and in countries which rely on a\nvoluntary military system. For, however an army is recruited, it is only\nthose men reaching a fairly high standard of fitness who are accepted,\nand these, even in times of peace are hampered in the task of carrying\non the race, which the less fit and the unfit are free to do at their\nown good pleasure. Nearly all the ways in which war and armies disturb\nthe normal course of affairs seem likely to interfere with eugenical\nbreeding, and none to favour it. Thus at one time, in the Napoleonic\nwars, the French age of conscription fell to eighteen, while marriage\nwas a cause of exemption, with the result of a vast increase of hasty\nand ill-advised marriages among boys, certainly injurious to the race.\nArmies, again, are highly favourable to the spread of racial poisons,\nespecially of syphilis, the most dangerous of all, and this cannot fail\nto be, in a marked manner, dysgenic rather than eugenic.\n\nThe Napoleonic wars furnished the first opportunity of testing the truth\nof Franklin's assertion concerning the disastrous effect of armies on\nthe race, by the collection of actual and precise data. But the\nsignificance of the data proved unexpectedly difficult to unravel, and\nmost writers on the subject have been largely occupied in correcting the\nmistakes of their predecessors. Villerme in 1829 remarked that the long\nseries of French wars up to 1815 must probably reduce the height of the\nFrench people, though he was unable to prove that this was so. Dufau in\n1840 was in a better position to judge, and he pointed out in his\n_Traite de Statistique_ that, comparing 1816 and 1835, the number of\nyoung men exempted from the army had doubled in the interval, even\nthough the regulation height had been lowered. This result, however, he\nheld, was not so alarming as it might appear, and probably only\ntemporary, for it was seemingly due to the fact that, in 1806 and the\nfollowing years, the male population was called to arms in masses, even\nyouths being accepted, so that a vast number of precocious marriages of\noften defective men took place. The result would only be terrible, Dufau\nbelieved, if prolonged; his results, however, were not altogether\nreliable, for he failed to note the proportion of men exempted to those\nexamined. The question was investigated more thoroughly by Tschuriloff\nin 1876.[5] He came to the conclusion that the Napoleonic wars had no\ngreat influence on stature, since the regulation height was lowered in\n1805, and abolished altogether for healthy men in 1811, and any defect\nof height in the next generation is speedily repaired. Tschuriloff\nagreed, however, that, though the influence of war in diminishing the\nheight of the race is unimportant, the influence of war in increasing\nphysical defects and infirmities in subsequent generations is a very\ndifferent matter. He found that the physical deterioration of war\nmanifested itself chiefly in the children born eight years afterwards,\nand therefore in the recruits twenty-eight years after the war. He\nregarded it as an undoubted fact that the French army of half a million\nmen in 1809 increased by 3 per cent. the proportion of hereditarily\ninfirm persons. He found, moreover, that the new-born of 1814, that is\nto say the military class of 1834, showed that infirmities had risen\nfrom 30 per cent. to 45.8 per cent., an increase of 50 per cent. Nor is\nthe _status quo_ entirely brought back later on, for the bad heredity of\nthe increased number of defectives tends to be still further propagated,\neven though in an attenuated form. As a matter of fact, Tschuriloff\nfound that the proportion of exemptions from the army for infirmity\nincreased enormously from 26 per cent. in 1816-17, to 38 per cent. in\n1826-27, declining later to 34 per cent. in 1860-64, though he is\ncareful to point out that this result must not be entirely ascribed to\nthe reversed selection of wars. There could, however, be no doubt that\nmost kinds of infirmities became more frequent as a result of military\nselection. Lapouge's more recent investigation into the results of the\nFranco-Prussian war of 1870 were of similar character; when examining\nthe recruits of 1892-93 he found that these \"children of the war\" were\ninferior to those born earlier, and that there was probably an undue\nproportion of defective individuals among their fathers. It cannot be\nsaid that these investigations finally demonstrate the evil results of\nwar on the race. The subject is complicated, and some authorities, like\nCollignon in France and Ammon in Germany,--both, it may be well to note,\narmy surgeons,--have sought to smooth down and explain away the dysgenic\neffects of war. But, on the whole, the facts seem to support those\nprobabilities which the insight of Franklin first clearly set forth.\n\nIt is interesting in the light of these considerations on the eugenic\nbearings of warfare to turn for a moment to those who proclaim the high\nmoral virtues of war as a national regenerator.\n\nIt is chiefly in Germany that, for more than a century past, this\ndoctrine has been preached.[6] \"War invigorates humanity,\" said Hegel,\n\"as storms preserve the sea from putrescence.\" \"War is an integral part\nof God's Universe,\" said Moltke, \"developing man's noblest attributes.\"\n\"The condemnation of war,\" said Treitschke, \"is not only absurd, it is\nimmoral.\"[7] These brave sayings scarcely bear calm and searching\nexamination at the best, but, putting aside all loftier appeals to\nhumanity or civilisation, a \"national regenerator\" which we have good\nreason to suppose enfeebles and deteriorates the race, cannot plausibly\nbe put before us as a method of ennobling humanity or as a part of God's\nUniverse, only to be condemned on pain of seeing a company of German\nprofessors pointing the finger to our appalling \"Immorality,\" on their\ndrill-sergeant's word of command.\n\nAt the same time, this glorification of the regenerating powers of war\nquite overlooks the consideration that the fighting spirit tends to\ndestroy itself, so that the best way to breed good fighters is not to\npreach war, but to cultivate peace, which is what the Germans have, in\nactual practice, done for over forty years past. France, the most\nmilitary, and the most gloriously military, nation of the Napoleonic\nera, is now the leader in anti-militarism, altogether indifferent to the\nlure of military glory, though behind no nation in courage or skill.\nBelgium has not fought for generations, and had only just introduced\ncompulsory military service, yet the Belgians, from their King and their\nCardinal-Archbishop downwards, threw themselves into the war with a high\nspirit scarcely paralleled in the world's history, and Belgian\ncommercial travellers developed a rare military skill and audacity. All\nthe world admires the bravery with which the Germans face death and the\nelaborate detail with which they organise battle, yet for all their\nperpetual glorification of war there is no sign that they fight with any\nmore spirit than their enemies. Even if we were to feel ourselves bound\nto accept war as \"an integral part of God's Universe,\" we need not\ntrouble ourselves to glorify war, for, when once war presents itself as\na terrible necessity, even the most peaceable of men are equal to the\ntask.\n\nThis consideration brings us to those \"moral equivalents of war\" which\nWilliam James was once concerned over, when he advocated, in place of\nmilitary conscription, \"a conscription of the whole youthful population\nto form for a certain number of years a part of the army enlisted\nagainst _Nature_.\"[8] Such a method of formally organising in the cause\nof civilisation, instead of in the cause of savagery, the old military\ntraditions of hardihood and discipline may well have its value. But the\npresent war has shown us that in no case need we fear that these high\nqualities will perish in any vitally progressive civilisation. For they\nare qualities that lie in the heart of humanity itself. They are not\ncreated by the drill-sergeant; he merely utilises them for his own, as\nwe may perhaps think, disastrous ends. This present war has shown us\nthat on every hand, even in the unlikeliest places, all the virtues of\nwar have been fostered by the cultivation of the arts and sciences of\npeace, ready to be transformed to warlike ends by men who never dreamed\nof war. In France we find many of the most promising young scientists,\npoets, and novelists cheerfully going forth to meet their death. On the\nother side, we find a Kreisler, created to be the joy of the world,\nready to be trampled to death beneath the hoofs of Cossack horses. The\nfriends of Gordon Mathison, the best student ever turned out from the\nMedical Faculty of the Melbourne University and a distinguished young\nphysiologist who seemed to be destined to become one of the first\nphysicians of his time, viewed with foreboding his resolve to go to the\nfront, for \"Wherever he was he had to be in the game,\" they said; and a\nfew weeks later he was killed at Gallipoli on the threshold of his\ncareer. The qualities that count in peace are the qualities that count\nin war, and the high-spirited man who throws himself bravely into the\ndangerous adventures of peace is fully the equal of the hero of the\nbattlefield, and himself prepared to become that hero.[9]\n\nIt would seem, therefore, on the whole, that when the eugenist takes a\nwide survey of this question, he need not qualify his disapproval of war\nby any regrets over the loss of such virtues as warfare fosters. In\nevery progressive civilisation the moral equivalents of war are already\nin full play. Peace, as well as war, \"develops the noblest attributes of\nman\"; peace, rather than war, preserves the human sea from putrescence;\nit is the condemnation of peace, rather than the condemnation of war,\nwhich is not only absurd but immoral. We are not called upon to choose\nbetween the manly virtues of war and the effeminate degeneracy of peace.\nThe Great War of to-day may perhaps help us to realise that the choice\nplaced before us is of another sort. The virtues of daring and endurance\nwill never fail in any vitally progressive community of men, alike in\nthe causes of war and of peace.[10] But on the one hand we find those\nvirtues at work in the service of humanity, creating ever new marvels of\nscience and of art, adding to the store of the precious heirlooms of the\nrace which are a joy to all mankind. On the other hand, we see these\nsame virtues in the service of savagery, extinguishing those marvels,\nkilling their creators, and destroying every precious treasure of\nmankind within reach. That--it seems to be one of the chief lessons of\nthis war--is the choice placed before us who are to-day called upon to\nbuild the world of the future on a firmer foundation than our own world\nhas been set.\n\n\n[1] D.S. Jordan, _War and the Breed_, 1915; also articles on \"War and\nManhood\" in the _Eugenics Review_, July, 1910, and on \"The Eugenics of\nWar\" in the same Review for Oct., 1913.\n\n[2] J. Arthur Thomson, \"Eugenics and War,\" _Eugenics Review_, April,\n1915. Major Leonard Darwin (_Journal Royal Statistical Society_, March,\n1916) sets forth a similar view.\n\n[3] It is true that in the Gourdon cavern, in the Pyrenees, representing\na very late and highly developed stage of Magdalenian culture, there\nare indications that human brains were eaten (Zaborowski, _L'Homme\nPrehistorique_, p. 86). It is surmised that they were the brains of\nenemies killed in battle, but this remains a surmise.\n\n[4] Zaborowski, _L'Homme Prehistorique_, pp. 121, 139; Lapouge, _Les\nSelections Sociales_, p. 209.\n\n[5] _Revue d'Anthropologie_, 1876, pp. 608 and 655.\n\n[6] In France it is almost unknown except as preached by the Syndicalist\nphilosopher, Georges Sorel, who insists, quite in the German manner, on\nthe purifying and invigorating effects of \"a great foreign war,\" although,\nvery unlike the German professors, he holds that \"a great extension of\nproletarian violence\" will do just as well as war.\n\n[7] The recent expressions of the same doctrine in Germany are far too\nnumerous to deal with. I may, however, refer to Professor Fritz\nWilke's _Ist der Krieg sittlich berechtigt?_ (1915) as being the work\nof a theologian and Biblical scholar of Vienna who has written a book\non the politics of Isaiah and discussed the germs of historical\nveridity in the history of Abraham. \"A world-history without war,\" he\ndeclares, \"would be a history of materialism and degeneration\"; and\nagain: \"The solution is not 'Weapons down!' but 'Weapons up!' With\npure hands and calm conscience let us grasp the sword.\" He dwells, of\ncourse, on the supposed purifying and ennobling effects of war and\ninsists that, in spite of its horrors, and when necessary, \"War is a\ndivine institution and a work of love.\" The leaders of the world's\npeace movement are, thank God! not Germans, but merely English and\nAmericans, and he sums up, with Moltke, that war is a part of the\nmoral order of the world.\n\n[8] William James, _Popular Science Monthly_, Oct., 1910.\n\n[9] We still often fall into the fallacy of over-estimating the\nadvantages of military training--with its fine air of set-up manliness\nand restrained yet vitalised discipline--because we are mostly\ncompelled to compare such training with the lack of training fostered\nby that tame, dull sedentary routine of which there is far too much in\nour present phase of civilisation. The remedy lies in stimulating the\nheroic and strenuous sides of civilisation rather than in letting\nloose the ravages of war. As Nietzsche long since pointed out (_Human,\nAll-too-Human_, section 442), the vaunted national armies of modern\ntimes are merely a method of squandering the most highly civilised\nmen, whose delicately organised brains have been slowly produced\nthrough long generations; \"in our day greater and higher tasks are\nassigned to men than _patria_ and _honor_, and the rough old Roman\npatriotism has become dishonourable, at the best behind the times.\"\n\n[10] The Border of Scotland and England was in ancient times, it has\nbeen said, \"a very Paradise for murderers and robbers.\" The war-like\nspirit was there very keen and deeds of daring were not too scrupulously\neffected, for the culprit knew that nothing was easier and safer than to\nbecome an outlaw on the other side of the Border. Yet these were the\nconditions that eventually made the Border one of the great British\ncentres of genius (the Welsh Border was another) and the home of a\npeculiarly capable and vigorous race.\n\n\n\n\nIV\n\n\nMORALITY IN WARFARE\n\nThere are some idealistic persons who believe that morality and war\nare incompatible. War is bestial, they hold, war is devilish; in its\npresence it is absurd, almost farcical, to talk about morality. That\nwould be so if morality meant the code, for ever unattained, of the\nSermon on the Mount. But there is not only the morality of Jesus, there\nis the morality of Mumbo Jumbo. In other words, and limiting ourselves\nto the narrower range of the civilised world, there is the morality of\nMachiavelli and Bismarck, and the morality of St. Francis and Tolstoy.\n\nThe fact is, as we so often forget, and sometimes do not even know,\nmorality is fundamentally custom, the _mores_, as it has been called,\nof a people. It is a body of conduct which is in constant motion, with\nan exalted advance-guard, which few can keep up with, and a debased\nrearguard, once called the black-guard, a name that has since acquired\nan appropriate significance. But in the substantial and central sense\nmorality means the conduct of the main body of the community. Thus\nunderstood, it is clear that in our time war still comes into contact\nwith morality. The pioneers may be ahead; the main body is in the thick\nof it.\n\nThat there really is a morality of war, and that the majority of\ncivilised people have more or less in common a certain conventional\ncode concerning the things which may or may not be done in war, has\nbeen very clearly seen during the present conflict. This moral code is\noften said to be based on international regulations and understandings.\nIt certainly on the whole coincides with them. But it is the popular\nmoral code which is fundamental, and international law is merely an\nattempt to enforce that morality.\n\nThe use of expanding bullets and poison gases, the poisoning of wells,\nthe abuse of the Red Cross and the White Flag, the destruction of\nchurches and works of art, the infliction of cruel penalties on\ncivilians who have not taken up arms--all such methods of warfare as\nthese shock popular morality. They are on each side usually attributed\nto the enemy, they are seldom avowed, and only adopted in imitation of\nthe enemy, with hesitation and some offence to the popular conscience,\nas we see in the case of poison gas, which was only used by the English\nafter long delay, while the French still hesitated. The general feeling\nabout such methods, even when involving scientific skill, is that they\nare \"barbarous.\"\n\nAs a matter of fact, this charge of \"barbarism\" against those methods\nof warfare which shock our moral sense must not be taken too literally.\nThe methods of real barbarians in war are not especially \"barbarous.\"\nThey have sometimes committed acts of cruelty which are revolting to us\nto-day, but for the most part the excesses of barbarous warfare have\nbeen looting and burning, together with more or less raping of women,\nand these excesses have been so frequent within the last century, and\nstill to-day, that they may as well be called \"civilised\" as\n\"barbarous.\" The sack of Rome by the Goths at the beginning of the\nfifth century made an immense impression on the ancient world, as an\nunparalleled outrage. St. Augustine in his _City of God_, written\nshortly afterwards, eloquently described the horrors of that time. Yet\nto-day, in the new light of our own knowledge of what war may involve,\nthe ways of the ancient Goths seem very innocent. We are expressly told\nthat they spared the sacred Christian places, and the chief offences\nbrought against them seem to be looting and burning; yet the treasure\nthey left untouched was vast and incalculable and we should be thankful\nindeed if any belligerent in the war of to-day inflicted as little\ninjury on a conquered city as the Goths on Rome. The vague rhetoric\nwhich this invasion inspired scarcely seems to be supported by\ndefinitely recorded facts, and there can be very little doubt that the\ndevastation wrought in many old wars exists chiefly in the writings of\nrhetorical chroniclers whose imaginations were excited, as we may so\noften see among the journalists of to-day, by the rumour of atrocities\nwhich have never been committed. This is not to say that no devastation\nand cruelty have been perpetrated in ancient wars. It seems to be\ngenerally agreed that in the famous Thirty Years' War, which the\nGermans fought against each other, atrocities were the order of the\nday. We are constantly being told, in respect of some episode or other\nof the war of to-day, that \"nothing like it has been seen since the\nThirty Years' War.\" But the writers who make this statement, with an\noff-hand air of familiar scholarship, never by any chance bring forward\nthe evidence for this greater atrociousness of the Thirty Years'\nWar,[1] and one is inclined to suspect that this oft-repeated allusion\nto the Thirty Years' War as the acme of military atrocity is merely a\nrhetorical flourish.\n\nIn any case we know that, not so many years after the Thirty Years'\nWar, Frederick the Great, who combined supreme military gifts with\nfreedom from scruple in policy, and was at the same time a great\nrepresentative German, declared that the ordinary citizen ought never\nto be aware that his country is at war.[2] Nothing could show more\nclearly the military ideal, however imperfectly it may sometimes have\nbeen attained, of the old European world. Atrocities, whether regarded\nas permissible or as inevitable, certainly occurred. But for the most\npart wars were the concern of the privileged upper class; they were\nrendered necessary by the dynastic quarrels of monarchs and were\ncarried out by a professional class with aristocratic traditions and a\nmore or less scrupulous regard to ancient military etiquette. There are\nmany stories of the sufferings of the soldiery in old times, in the\nmidst of abundance, on account of military respect for civilian\nproperty. Von der Goltz remarks that \"there was a time when the troops\ncamped in the cornfields and yet starved,\" and states that in 1806 the\nPrussian main army camped close to huge piles of wood and yet had no\nfires to warm themselves or cook their food.[3]\n\nThe legend, if legend it is, of the French officer who politely\nrequested the English officer opposite him to \"fire first\" shows how\nsomething of the ancient spirit of chivalry was still regarded as the\naccompaniment of warfare. It was an occupation which only incidentally\nconcerned the ordinary citizen. The English, especially, protected by\nthe sea and always living in open undefended cities, have usually been\nable to preserve this indifference to the continental wars in which\ntheir kings have constantly been engaged, and, as we see, even in the\nmost unprotected European countries, and the most profoundly warlike,\nthe Great Frederick set forth precisely the same ideal of war.\n\nThe fact seems to be that while war is nowadays less chronic than of\nold, less prolonged, and less easily provoked, it is a serious fallacy\nto suppose that it is also less barbarous. We imagine that it must be\nso simply because we believe, on more or less plausible grounds, that\nour life generally is growing less barbarous and more civilised. But\nwar, by its very nature, always means a relapse from civilisation into\nbarbarism, if not savagery.[4] We may sympathise with the endeavour of\nthe European soldiers of old to civilise warfare, and we may admire the\nremarkable extent to which they succeeded in doing so. But we cannot\nhelp feeling that their romantic and chivalrous notions of warfare were\nabsurdly incongruous.\n\nThe world in general might have been content with that incongruity. But\nGermany, or more precisely Prussia, with its ancient genius for\nwarfare, has in the present war taken the decisive step in initiating\nthe abolition of that incongruity by placing warfare definitely on the\nbasis of scientific barbarism. To do this is, in a sense, we must\nremember, not a step backwards, but a step forward. It involved the\nrecognition of the fact that War is not a game to be played for its own\nsake, by a professional caste, in accordance with fixed rules which it\nwould be dishonourable to break, but a method, carried out by the whole\norganised manhood of the nation, of effectively attaining an end\ndesired by the State, in accordance with the famous statement of\nClausewitz that war is State policy continued by a different method. If\nby the chivalrous method of old, which was indeed in large part still\ntheir own method in the previous Franco-German war, the Germans had\nresisted the temptation to violate the neutrality of Luxemburg and\nBelgium in order to rush behind the French defences, and had battered\ninstead at the Gap of Belfort, they would have won the sympathy of the\nworld, but they certainly would not have won the possession of the\ngreater part of Belgium and a third part of France. It has not alone\nbeen military instinct which has impelled Germany on the new course\nthus inaugurated. We see here the final outcome of a reaction against\nancient Teutonic sentimentality which the insight of Goldwin Smith\nclearly discerned forty years ago.[5] Humane sentiments and civilised\ntraditions, under the moulding hand of Prussian leaders of Kultur,\nhave been slowly but firmly subordinated to a political realism which,\nin the military sphere, means a masterly efficiency in the aim of\ncrushing the foe by overwhelming force combined with panic-striking\n\"frightfulness.\" In this conception, that only is moral which served\nthese ends. The horror which this \"frightfulness\" may be expected to\narouse, even among neutral nations, is from the German point of view a\ntribute of homage.\n\nThe military reputation of Germany is so great in the world, and likely\nto remain so, whatever the issue of the present war, that we are here\nfaced by a grave critical issue which concerns the future of the whole\nworld. The conduct of wars has been transformed before our eyes. In any\nfuture war the example of Germany will be held to consecrate the new\nmethods, and the belligerents who are not inclined to accept the\nsupreme authority of Germany may yet be forced in their own interests\nto act in accordance with it. The mitigating influence of religion over\nwarfare has long ceased to be exercised, for the international Catholic\nChurch no longer possesses the power to exert such influence, while the\nnational Protestant churches are just as bellicose as their flacks. Now\nwe see the influence of morality over warfare similarly tending to\ndisappear. Henceforth, it seems, we have to reckon with a conception of\nwar which accounts it a function of the supreme State, standing above\nmorality and therefore able to wage war independently of morality.\nNecessity--the necessity of scientific effectiveness--becomes the sole\ncriterion of right and wrong.\n\nWhen we look back from the standpoint of knowledge which we have\nreached in the present war to the notions which prevailed in the past,\nthey seem to us hollow and even childish. Seventy years ago, Buckle, in\nhis _History of Civilisation_, stated complacently that only ignorant\nand unintellectual nations any longer cherished ideals of war. His\nstatement was part of the truth. It is true, for instance, that France\nis now the most anti-military of nations, though once the most military\nof all. But, we see, it is only part of the truth. The very fact, which\nBuckle himself pointed out, that efficiency has in modern times taken\nthe place of morality in the conduct of affairs, offers a new\nfoundation for war when war is urged on scientific principle for the\npurpose of rendering effective the claims of State policy. To-day we\nsee that it is not sufficient for a nation to cultivate knowledge and\nbecome intellectual, in the expectation that war will automatically go\nout of fashion. It is quite possible to become very scientific, most\nrelentlessly intellectual, and on that foundation to build up ideals of\nwarfare much more barbarous than those of Assyria.\n\nThe conclusion seems to be that we are to-day entering on an era in\nwhich war will not only flourish as vigorously as in the past, although\nnot in so chronic a form, but with an altogether new ferocity and\nruthlessness, with a vastly increased power of destruction, and on a\nscale of extent and intensity involving an injury to civilisation and\nhumanity which no wars of the past ever perpetrated. Moreover, this\nstate of things imposes on the nations which have hitherto, by their\ntemper, their position, or their small size, regarded themselves as\nnationally neutral, a new burden of armament in order to ensure that\nneutrality. It has been proclaimed on both sides that this war is a war\nto destroy militarism. But the disappearance of a militarism that is\nonly destroyed by a greater militarism offers no guarantee at all for\nany triumph of Civilisation or Humanity.\n\nWhat then are we to do? It seems clear that we have to recognise that\nour intellectual leaders of old who declared that to ensure the\ndisappearance of war we have but to sit still and fold our hands while\nwe watch the beneficent growth of science and intellect were grievously\nmistaken. War is still one of the active factors of modern life, though\nby no means the only factor which it is in our power to grasp and\ndirect. By our energetic effort the world can be moulded. It is the\nconcern of all of us, and especially of those nations which are strong\nenough and enlightened enough to take a leading part in human affairs,\nto work towards the initiation and the organisation of this immense\neffort. In so far as the Great War of to-day acts as a spur to such\neffort it will not have been an unmixed calamity.\n\n\n[1] In so far as it may have been so, that seems merely due to its\ngreat length, to the fact that the absence of commissariat arrangements\ninvolved a more thorough method of pillage, and to epidemics.\n\n[2] Treitschke, _History of Germany_ (English translation by E. and C.\nPaul), Vol. I., p. 87.\n\n[3] Von der Goltz, _The Nation in Arms_, pp. 14 _et seq._ This attitude\nwas a final echo of the ancient Truce of God. That institution, which\nwas first definitely formulated in the early eleventh century in\nRoussillon and was soon confirmed by the Pope in agreement with nobles\nand barons, was extended to the whole of Christendom before the end of\nthe century. It ordained peace for several days a week and on many\nfestivals, and it guaranteed the rights and liberties of all those\nfollowing peaceful avocations, at the same time protecting crops,\nlive-stock, and farm implements.\n\n[4] It is interesting to observe how St. Augustine, who was as familiar\nwith classic as with Christian life and thought, perpetually dwells on\nthe boundless misery of war and the supreme desirability of peace as a\npoint at which pagan and Christian are at one; \"Nihil gratius soleat\naudiri, nihil desiderabilius concupisci, nihil postremo possit melius\ninveniri ... Sicut nemo est qui gaudere nolit, ita nemo est qui pacem\nhabere nolit\" (_City of God_, Bk. XIX., Chs. 11-12).\n\n[5] _Contemporary Review_, 1878.\n\n\n\n\nV\n\n\nIS WAR DIMINISHING?\n\nThe cheerful optimism of those pacifists who looked for the speedy\nextinction of war has lately aroused much scorn. There really seem to\nhave been people who believed that new virtues of loving-kindness are\nspringing up in the human breast to bring about the universal reign of\npeace spontaneously, while we all still continued to cultivate our old\nvices of international greed, suspicion, and jealousy. Dr. Frederick\nAdams Woods, in the challenging and stimulating study of the prevalence\nof war in Europe from 1450 to the present day which he has lately\nwritten in conjunction with Mr. Alexander Baltzly, easily throws\ncontempt upon such pacifists. All their beautiful arguments, he tells\nus in effect, count for nothing. War is to-day raging more furiously\nthan ever in the world, and it is even doubtful whether it is\ndiminishing. That is the subject of the book Dr. Woods and Mr. Baltzly\nhave written: _Is War Diminishing?_\n\nThe method adopted by these authors is to count up the years of war\nsince 1450 for each of the eleven chief nations of Europe possessing an\nancient history, and to represent the results by the aid of charts.\nThese charts show that certainly there has been a great falling off in\nwar during the period in question. Wars, as there presented to us, seem\nto have risen to a climax in the century 1550-1650 and to have been\ndeclining ever since. The authors, themselves, however, are not quite\nin sympathy with their own conclusion. \"There is only,\" Dr. Woods\ndeclares, \"a moderate amount of probability in favour of declining\nwar.\" He insists on the fact that the period under investigation\nrepresents but a very small fraction of the life of man. He finds that\nif we take England several centuries further back, and compare its\nnumber of war-years during the last four centuries with those during\nthe preceding four centuries, the first period shows 212 years of war,\nthe second shows 207 years, a negligible difference, while for France\nthe corresponding number of war-years are 181 and 192, an actual and\nrather considerable increase. There is the further consideration that\nif we regard not frequency but intensity of war--if we could, for\ninstance, measure a war by its total number of casualties--we should\ndoubtless find that wars are showing a tendency to ever-increasing\ngravity. On the whole, Dr. Woods is clearly rather discontented with\nthe tendency of his own and his collaborator's work to show a\ndiminution of war, and modestly casts doubt on all those who believe\nthat the tendency of the world's history is in the direction of such a\ndiminution.\n\nAn honest and careful record of facts, however, is always valuable. Dr.\nWoods' investigation will be found useful even by those who are by no\nmeans anxious to throw cold water over the too facile optimism of some\npacifists, and this little book suggests lines of thought which may\nprove fruitful in various directions, not always foreseen by the\nauthors.\n\nDr. Woods emphasises the long period in the history of the human race\nduring which war has flourished. He seems to suggest that war, after\nall, may be an essential and beneficial element in human affairs,\ndestined to endure to the end, just as it has been present from the\nbeginning. But has it been present from the beginning? Even though war\nmay have flourished for many thousands of years--and it was certainly\nflourishing at the dawn of history--we are still very far indeed from\nthe dawn of human life or even of human civilisation, for the more our\nknowledge of the past grows the more remote that dawn is seen to be. It\nis not only seen to be very remote, it is seen to be very important.\nDarwin said that it was during the first three years of life that a man\nlearnt most. That saying is equally true of humanity as a whole, though\nhere one must translate years into hundreds of thousands of years. But\nneither infant man nor infant mankind could establish themselves firmly\non the path that leads so far if they had at the very outset, in\naccordance with Dr. Woods' formula for more recent ages, \"fought about\nhalf the time.\" An activity of this kind which may be harmless, or even\nin some degree beneficial at a later stage, would be fatally disastrous\nat an early stage. War, as Mankind understands war, seems to have no\nplace among animals living in Nature. It seems equally to have had no\nplace, so far as investigation has yet been able to reveal, in the life\nof early man. Men were far too busy in the great fight against Nature\nto fight against each other, far too absorbed in the task of inventing\nmethods of self-preservation to have much energy left for inventing\nmethods of self-destruction. It was once supposed that the Homeric\nstories of war presented a picture of life near the beginning of the\nworld. The Homeric picture in fact corresponds to a stage in human\nbarbarism, certainly in its European manifestation, a stage also passed\nthrough in Northern Europe, where, nearly fifteen hundred years ago,\nthe Greek traveller, Posidonius, found the Celtic chieftains in Britain\nliving much like the people in Homer. But we now know that Homer, so\nfar from bringing before us a primitive age, really represents the end\nof a long stage of human development, marked by a slow and steady\ngrowth in civilisation and a vast accumulation of luxury. War is a\nluxury, in other words a manifestation of superfluous energy, not\npossible in those early stages when all the energies of men are taken\nup in the primary business of preserving and maintaining life. So it\nwas that war had a beginning in human history. Is it unreasonable to\nsuppose that it will also have an end?\n\nThere is another way, besides that of counting the world's war-years,\nto determine the probability of the diminution and eventual\ndisappearance of war. We may consider the causes of war, and the extent\nto which these causes are, or are not, ceasing to operate. Dr. Woods\npassingly realises the importance of this test and even enumerates what\nhe considers to be the causes of war, without, however, following up\nhis clue. As he reckons them, they are four in number: racial,\neconomic, religious, and personal. There is frequently a considerable\namount of doubt concerning the cause of a particular war, and no doubt\nthe causes are usually mixed and slowly accumulative, just as in\ndisease a number of factors may have gradually combined to bring on the\nsudden overthrow of health. There can be no doubt that the four causes\nenumerated have been very influential in producing war. There can,\nhowever, be equally little doubt that nearly all of them are\ndiminishing in their war-producing power. Religion, which after the\nReformation seemed to foment so many wars, is now practically almost\nextinct as a cause of war in Europe. Economic causes which were once\nregarded as good and sound motives for war have been discredited,\nthough they cannot be said to be abolished; in the Middle Ages fighting\nwas undoubtedly a most profitable business, not only by the booty which\nmight thus be obtained, but by the high ransoms which even down to the\nseventeenth century might be legitimately demanded for prisoners. So\nthat war with France was regarded as an English gentleman's best method\nof growing rich. Later it was believed that a country could capture the\n\"wealth\" of another country by destroying that country's commerce, and\nin the eighteenth century that doctrine was openly asserted even by\nresponsible statesmen; later, the growth of political economy made\nclear that every nation flourishes by the prosperity of other nations,\nand that by impoverishing the nation with which it traded a nation\nimpoverishes itself, for a tradesman cannot grow rich by killing his\ncustomers. So it came about that, as Mill put it, the commercial\nspirit, which during one period of European history was the principal\ncause of war, became one of its strongest obstacles, though, since Mill\nwrote, the old fallacy that it is a legitimate and advantageous method\nto fight for markets, has frequently reappeared.[1] Again, the personal\ncauses of war, although in a large measure incalculable, have much\nsmaller scope under modern conditions than formerly. Under ancient\nconditions, with power centred in despotic monarchs or autocratic\nministers, the personal causes of war counted for much. In more recent\ntimes it has been said, truly or falsely, that the Crimean War was due\nto the wounded feelings of a diplomatist. Under modern conditions,\nhowever, the checks on individual initiative are so many that personal\ncauses must play an ever-diminishing part in war.\n\nThe same can scarcely be said as regards Dr. Woods' remaining cause of\nwar. If by racialism we are to understand nationalism, this has of late\nbeen a serious and ever-growing provocative of war. Internationalism of\nfeeling is much less marked now than it was four centuries ago.\nNationalities have developed a new self-consciousness, a new impulse to\nregain their old territories or to acquire new territories. Not only\nPan-Germanism, Pan-Slavism, and British Imperialism, like all other\nimperialisms, but even the national ambitions of some smaller Powers\nhave acquired a new and dangerous energy. They are not the less\ndangerous when, as is indeed most frequently the case, they merely\nrepresent the ambition, not of the people as a whole, but merely of a\nmilitary or bureaucratic clique, of a small chauvinistic group, yet\nnoisy and energetic enough to win over unscrupulous politicians. A\nGerman soldier, a young journalist of ability, recently wrote home from\nthe trenches: \"I have often dreamed of a new Europe in which all the\nnations would be fraternally united and live together as one people; it\nwas an end which democratic feeling seemed to be slowly preparing. Now\nthis terrible war has been unchained, fomented by a few men who are\nsending their subjects, their slaves rather, to the battlefield, to\nslay each other like wild beasts. I should like to go towards these men\nthey call our enemies and say, 'Brothers, let us fight together. The\nenemy is behind us.' Yes, since I have been wearing this uniform I feel\nno hatred for those who are in front, but my hatred has grown for those\nin power who are behind.\" That is a sentiment which must grow mightily\nwith the growth of democracy, and as it grows the danger of nationalism\nas a cause of war must necessarily decrease.\n\nThere is, however, one group of causes of war, of the first importance,\nwhich Dr. Woods has surprisingly omitted, and that is the group of\npolitical causes. It is by overlooking the political aspects of war\nthat Dr. Woods' discussion is most defective. Supposed political\nnecessity has been in modern times perhaps the very chief cause of war.\nThat is to say that wars are largely waged for what has been supposed\nto be the protection, or the furtherance, of the civilised organisation\nwhich orders the temporal benefits of a nation. This is admirably\nillustrated by all three of the great European wars in which England\nhas taken part during the past four centuries: the war against Spain,\nthe war against France, and the present war against Germany. The\nfundamental motive of England's participation in all these wars has\nbeen what was conceived to be the need of England's safety, it was\nessentially political. A small island Power, dependent on its fleet,\nand yet very closely adjoining the continental mainland, is vitally\nconcerned in the naval developments of possibly hostile Powers and in\nthe military movements which affect the opposite coast. Spain, France,\nand Germany all successively threatened England by a formidable fleet,\nand they all sought to gain possession of the coast opposite England.\nTo England, therefore, it seemed a measure of political self-defence to\nstrike a blow as each fresh menace arose. In every case Belgium has\nbeen the battlefield on land. The neutrality of Belgium is felt to be\npolitically vital to England. Therefore, the invasion of Belgium by a\nGreat Power is to England an immediate signal of war. It is not only\nEngland's wars that have been mainly political; the same is true of\nGermany's wars ever since Prussia has had the leadership of Germany.\nThe political condition of a country without natural frontiers and\nsurrounded by powerful neighbours is a perpetual source of wars which,\nin Germany's case, have been, by deliberate policy, offensively\ndefensive.\n\nWhen we realise the fundamental importance of the political causation\nof warfare, the whole problem of the ultimate fate of war becomes at\nonce more hopeful. The orderly growth and stability of nations has in\nthe past seemed to demand war. But war is not the only method of\nsecuring these ends, and to most people nowadays it scarcely seems the\nbest method. England and France have fought against each other for many\ncenturies. They are now convinced that they really have nothing to\nfight about, and that the growth and stability of each country are\nbetter ensured by friendship than by enmity. There cannot be a doubt of\nit. But where is the limit to the extension of that same principle?\nFrance and Germany, England and Germany, have just as much to lose by\nenmity, just as much to gain by friendship, and alike on both sides.\n\nThe history of Europe and the charts of Mr. Baltzly clearly show that\nthis consideration has really been influential. We find that there is a\nprogressive tendency for the nations of Europe to abandon warfare.\nSweden, Denmark, and Holland, all vigorous and warlike peoples, have\nlong ceased to fight. They have found their advantage in the\nabandonment of war, but that abandonment has been greatly stimulated by\nawe of their mightier neighbours. And therein, again, we have a clue to\nthe probable course of the future.\n\nFor when we realise that the fundamental political need of\nself-preservation and good order has been a main cause of warfare, and\nwhen we further realise that the same ends may be more satisfactorily\nattained without war under the influence of a sufficiently firm\nexternal pressure working in harmony with the growth of internal\ncivilisation, we see that the problem of fighting among nations is the\nsame as that of fighting among individuals. Once upon a time good order\nand social stability were maintained in a community by the method of\nfighting among the individuals constituting the community. No doubt all\nsorts of precious virtues were thus generated, and no doubt in the\ngeneral opinion no better method seemed possible or even conceivable.\nBut, as we know, with the development of a strong central Power, and\nwith the growth of enlightenment, it was realised that political\nstability and good order were more satisfactorily maintained by a\ntribunal, having a strong police force behind it, than by the method of\nallowing the individuals concerned to fight out their quarrels between\nthemselves.\n\nFighting between national groups of individuals stands on precisely the\nsame footing as fighting between individuals. The political stability\nand good order of nations, it is beginning to be seen, can be more\nsatisfactorily maintained by a tribunal, having a strong police force\nbehind it, than by the method of allowing the individual nations\nconcerned to fight out quarrels between themselves. The stronger\nnations have for a large part imposed this peace upon the smaller\nnations of Europe to the great benefit of the latter. How can we impose\na similar peace upon the stronger nations, for their own benefit and\nfor the benefit of the whole world? To that task all our energies must\nbe directed.\n\nA long series of eminent thinkers and investigators, from Comte and\nBuckle a century ago to Dr. Woods and Mr. Baltzly to-day, have assured\nus that war is diminishing and even that the war-like spirit is\nextinct. It is certainly not true that the war-like spirit is extinct,\neven in the most civilised and peaceful peoples, and we need not desire\nits extinction, for it is capable of transformation into shapes of the\nfinest use for humanity. But the vast conflagration of to-day must not\nconceal from our eyes the great central fact that war is diminishing,\nand will one day disappear as completely as the mediaeval scourge of\nthe Black Death. To reach this consummation all the best humanising and\ncivilising energies of mankind will be needed.\n\n\n[1] It has been argued (as by Filippi Carli, _La Ricchezza e la Guerra_,\n1916) that the Germans are especially unable to understand that the\nprosperity of other countries is beneficial to them, whether or not\nunder German control, and that they differ from the English and French\nin believing that economic conquests should involve political conquests.\n\n\n\n\nVI\n\n\nWAR AND THE BIRTH-RATE\n\nDuring recent years the faith had grown among progressive persons in\nvarious countries, not excluding Germany, that civilisation was building\nup almost impassable barriers against any great war. These barriers were\nthought to be of various kinds, even apart from the merely sentimental\nand humanitarian developments of pacific feeling. They were especially\nof an economic kind, and that on a double basis, that of Capital and\nthat of Labour. It was believed, on the one hand, that the international\nramifications of Capital, and the complicated commercial and financial\nwebs which bind nations together, would cause so vivid a realisation of\nthe disasters of war as to erect a wholesomely steadying effect whenever\nthe danger of war loomed in sight. On the other hand, it was felt that\nthe international unity of interest among the workers, the growth of\nLabour's favourite doctrine that there is no conflict between nations,\nbut only between classes, and even the actual international organisation\nand bonds of the workers' associations, would interpose a serious menace\nto the plans of war-makers. These influences were real and important.\nBut, as we know, when the decisive moment came, the diplomatists and the\nmilitarists were found to be at the helm, to steer the ship of State in\neach country concerned, and those on board had no voice in determining\nthe course. In England only can there be said to have been any show of\nconsulting Parliament, but at that moment the situation had already so\nfar developed that there was little left but to accept it. The Great War\nof to-day has shown that such barriers against war as we at present\npossess may crumble away in a moment at the shock of the war-making\nmachine.\n\nWe are to-day forced to undertake a more searching inquiry into the\nforces which, in civilisation, operate against war. I wish to call\nattention here to one such influence of fundamental character, which has\nnot been unrecognised, but possesses an importance we are often apt to\noverlook.\n\n\"A French gentleman, well acquainted with the constitution of his\ncountry,\" wrote Thicknesse in 1776,[1] \"told me above eight years since\nthat France increased so rapidly in peace that they must necessarily\nhave a war every twelve or fourteen years to carry off the refuse of the\npeople.\" Recently a well-known German Socialist, Dr. Eduard David,\nmember of the Reichstag and a student of the population question,\nsetting forth the same great truth (in _Die Neue Generation_ for\nNovember, 1914) states that it would have been impossible for Germany to\nwage the present war if it had not been for the high German birth-rate\nduring the past half-century. And the impossibility of this war would,\nfor Dr. David, have been indeed tragic.\n\nA more distinguished social hygienist, Professor Max Gruber, of Munich,\nwho took a leading part in organising that marvellous Exposition of\nHygiene at Dresden which has been Germany's greatest service to real\ncivilisation in recent years, lately set forth an identical opinion.\nThe war, he declares, was inevitable and unavoidable, and Germany was\nresponsible for it, not, he hastens to add, in any moral sense, but in a\nbiological sense, because in forty-four years Germans have increased in\nnumbers from forty millions to eighty millions. The war was, therefore,\na \"biological necessity.\"\n\nIf we survey the belligerent nations in the war we may say that those\nwhich took the initiative in drawing it on, or at all events were most\nprepared to welcome it, were Russia, Austria, Germany, and Serbia. We\nmay also note that these include nearly all the nations in Europe with a\nhigh birth-rate. We may further note that they are all nations\nwhich--putting aside their cultural summits and taking them in the\nmass--are among the most backward in Europe; the fall in the birth-rate\nhas not yet had time to permeate them. On the other hand, of the\nbelligerent peoples of to-day, all indications point to the French as\nthe people most intolerant, silently but deeply, of the war they are so\nably and heroically waging. Yet the France of the present, with the\nlowest birth-rate and the highest civilisation, was a century ago the\nFrance of a birth-rate higher than that of Germany to-day, the most\nmilitarist and aggressive of nations, a perpetual menace to Europe. For\nall those among us who have faith in civilisation and humanity, and are\nunable to believe that war can ever be a civilising or humanising method\nof progress, it must be a daily prayer that the fall of the birth-rate\nmay be hastened.\n\nIt seems too elementary a point to insist on, yet the mists of ignorance\nand prejudice are so dense, the cataract of false patriotism is so\nthick, that for many even the most elementary truths cannot be\ndiscerned. In most of the smaller nations, indeed, an intelligent view\nprevails. Their smallness has, on the one hand, rendered them more open\nto international culture, and, on the other hand, enabled them to\noutgrow the illusions of militarism; there is a higher standard of\neducation among them; their birth-rates are low and they accept that\nfact as a condition of progressive civilisation. That is the case in\nSwitzerland, as in Norway, and notably in Holland. It is not so in the\nlarger nations. Here we constantly find, even in those lands where the\nbulk of the population are civilised and reasonably level-headed, a small\nminority who publicly tear their hair and rage at the steady decline in\nthe birth-rate. It is, of course, only the declining birth-rate of their\nown country that they have in view; for they are \"patriots,\" which means\nthat the fall of the birth-rate in all other countries but their own is\na source of much gratification. \"Woe to us,\" they exclaim in effect, \"if\nwe follow the example of these wicked and degenerate peoples! Our nation\nneeds men. We have to populate the earth and to carry the blessings of\nour civilised culture all over the world. In executing that high mission\nwe cannot have too much cannon-fodder in defending ourselves against the\njealousy and aggression of other nations. Let us promote parentage by\nlaw; let us repress by law every influence which may encourage a falling\nbirth-rate; otherwise there is nothing left to us but speedy national\ndisaster, complete and irremediable.\" This is not caricature,[2] though\nthese apostles of \"race-suicide\" may easily arouse a smile by the verbal\nardour of their procreative energy. But we have to recognise that in\nGermany for years past it has been difficult to take up a serious\nperiodical without finding some anxiously statistical article about the\nfalling birth-rate and some wild recommendations for its arrest, for it\nis the militaristic German who of all Europeans is most worried by this\nfall; indeed Germans often even refuse to recognise it. Thus to-day we\nfind Professor Gruber declaring that if the population of the German\nEmpire continues to grow at the rate of the first five years of the\npresent century, at the end of the century it will have reached\n250,000,000. By such a vast increase in population, the Professor\ncomplacently concludes, \"Germany will be rendered invulnerable.\" We know\nwhat that means. The presence of an \"invulnerable\" nation among nations\nthat are \"vulnerable\" means inevitable aggression and war, a perpetual\nmenace to civilisation and humanity. It is not along that line that hope\ncan be found for the world's future, or even Germany's future, and\nGruber conveniently neglects to estimate what, on his basis, the\npopulation of Russia will be at the end of the century. But Gruber's\nestimate is altogether fallacious. German births have fallen, roughly\nspeaking, about one per thousand of the population, every year since the\nbeginning of the century, and it would be equally reasonable to estimate\nthat if they continue to fall at the present rate (which we cannot, of\ncourse, anticipate) births will altogether have ceased in Germany long\nbefore the end of the century. The German birth-rate reached its climax\nforty years ago (1871-1880) with 40.7 per 1,000; in 1906 it was 34 per\n1,000; in 1909, 31 per 1,000; in 1912, 28 per 1,000; in an almost\nmeasurable period of time, in all probability long before the end of the\ncentury, it will have reached the same low level as that of France, when\nthere will be little difference between the \"invulnerability\" of France\nand of Germany, a consummation which, for the world's sake, is far more\ndevoutly to be wished than that anticipated by Gruber.\n\nWe have to remember, moreover, that this tendency is by no means, as we\nare sometimes tempted to suppose, a sign of degeneration or of decay;\nbut, on the contrary, a sign of progress. When we survey broadly that\ncourse of zoological evolution of which we are pleased to regard Man as\nthe final outcome, we note that on the whole the mighty stream has\nbecome the less productive as it has advanced. We note the same of the\nvarious lines taken separately. We note, also, that intelligence and all\nthe qualities we admire have usually been most marked in the less\nprolific species. Progress, roughly speaking, has proved incompatible\nwith high fertility. And the reason is not far to seek. If the creature\nproduced is more evolved, it is more complex and more highly organised,\nand that means the need for much time and much energy. To attain this,\nthe offspring must be few and widely spaced; it cannot be attained at\nall under conditions that are highly destructive. The humble herring,\nwhich evokes the despairing envy of our human apostles of fertility, is\nlargely composed of spawn, and produces a vast number of offspring, of\nwhich few reach maturity. The higher mammals spend their lives in the\nproduction of a small number of offspring, most of whom survive. Thus,\neven before Man began, we see a fundamental principle established, and\nthe relationship between the birth-rate and the death-rate in working\norder. All progressive evolution may be regarded as a mechanism for\nconcentrating an ever greater amount of energy in the production of ever\nfewer and ever more splendid individuals. Nature is perpetually striving\nto replace the crude ideal of quantity by the higher ideal of quality.\n\nIn human history these same tendencies have continually been\nillustrated. The Greeks, our pioneers in all insight and knowledge,\ngrappled (as Professor Myres has lately set forth[3]), and realised that\nthey were grappling, with this same problem. Even in the Minoan Age\ntheir population would appear to have been full to overflowing; \"there\nwere too many people in the world,\" and to the old Greeks the Trojan War\nwas the earliest divinely-appointed remedy. Wars, famines, pestilences,\ncolonisation, wide-spread infanticide were the methods, voluntary and\ninvoluntary, by which this excessive birth-rate was combated, while the\ngreatest of Greek philosophers, a Plato or an Aristotle, clearly saw\nthat a regulated and limited birth-rate, a eugenically improved race, is\nthe road to higher civilisation. We may even see in Greek antiquity how\na sudden rise in industrialism leads to a crowded and fertile urban\npopulation, the extension of slavery, and all the resultant evils. It\nwas a foretaste of what was seen during the eighteenth and nineteenth\ncenturies, when a sudden industrial expansion led to an enormously high\nbirth-rate, a servile urban proletariat (that very word indicates, as\nRoscher has pointed out, that a large family means inferiority), and a\nconsequent outburst of misery and degradation from which we are only now\nemerging.\n\nAs we are now able to realise, the sudden expansion of the population\naccompanying the industrial revolution was an abnormal and, from the\npoint of view of society, a morbid phenomenon. All the evidence goes to\nshow that previously the population tended to increase very slowly, and\nsocial evolution was thus able to take place equably and harmoniously.\nIt is only gradually that the birth-rate has begun to right itself\nagain. The movement, as is well known, began in France, always the most\nadvanced outpost of European civilisation. It has now spread to England,\nto Germany, to all Europe, to the whole world indeed, in so far as the\nworld is in touch with European civilisation, and has long been well\nmarked in the United States.\n\nWhen we realise this we are also enabled to realise how futile, how\nmisplaced, and how mischievous it is to raise the cry of \"Race-suicide.\"\nIt is futile because no outcry can affect a world-wide movement of\ncivilisation. It is misplaced because the rise and fall of the\npopulation is not a matter of the birth-rate alone, but of the\nbirth-rate combined with the death-rate, and while we cannot expect to\ntouch the former we can influence the latter. It is mischievous because\nby fighting against a tendency which is not only inevitable but\naltogether beneficial, we blind ourselves to the advance of civilisation\nand risk the misdirection of all our energies. How far this blindness\nmay be carried we see in the false patriotism of those who in the\ndecline of the birth-rate fancy they see the ruin of their own\nparticular country, oblivious of the fact that we are concerned with a\nphenomenon of world-wide extension.\n\nThe whole tendency of civilisation is to reduce the birth-rate, as\nLeroy-Beaulieu concludes in his comprehensive work on the population\nquestion. We may go further, and assert with the distinguished German\neconomist, Roscher, that the chief cause of the superiority of a highly\ncivilised State over lower stages of civilisation is precisely a greater\ndegree of forethought and self-control in marriage and child-bearing.[4]\nInstead of talking about race-suicide, we should do well to observe at\nwhat an appalling rate, even yet, the population is increasing, and we\nshould note that it is everywhere the poorest and most primitive\ncountries, and in every country (as in Germany) the poorest regions,\nwhich show the highest birth-rate. On every hand, however, are hopeful\nsigns. Thus, in Russia, where a very high birth-rate is to some extent\ncompensated by a very high death-rate--the highest infantile death-rate\nin Europe--the birth-rate is falling, and we may anticipate that it will\nfall very rapidly with the extension of education and social\nenlightenment among the masses. Driven out of Europe, the alarmist falls\nback on the \"Yellow Peril.\" But in Japan we find amid confused\nvariations of the birth-rate and the death-rate nothing to indicate any\nalarming expansion of the population, while as to China we are in the\ndark. We only know that in China there is a high birth-rate largely\ncompensated by a very high death-rate. We also know, however, that as\nLowes Dickinson has lately reminded us, \"the fundamental attitude of the\nChinese towards life is that of the most modern West,\"[5] and we shall\nprobably find that with the growth of enlightenment the Chinese will\ndeal with their high birth-rate in a far more radical and thorough\nmanner than we have ever ventured on.\n\nOne last resort the would-be patriotic alarmist seeks when all others\nfail. He is good enough to admit that a general decline in the\nbirth-rate might be beneficial. But, he points out, it affects social\nclasses unequally. It is initiated, not by the degenerate and the unfit,\nwhom we could well dispense with, but by the very best classes in the\ncommunity, the well-to-do and the educated. One is inclined to remark,\nat once, that a social change initiated by its best social classes is\nscarcely likely to be pernicious. Where, it may be asked, if not among\nthe most educated classes, is any process of amelioration to be\ninitiated? We cannot make the world topsy-turvy to suit the convenience\nof topsy-turvy minds. All social movements tend to begin at the top and\nto permeate downwards. This has been the case with the decline in the\nbirth-rate, but it is already well marked among the working classes, and\nhas only failed to touch the lowest social stratum of all, too\nweak-minded and too reckless to be amenable to ordinary social motives.\nThe rational method of meeting this situation is not a propaganda in\nfavour of procreation--a truly imbecile propaganda, since it is only\ncarried out and only likely to be carried out, by the very class which\nwe wish to sterilise--but by a wise policy of regulative eugenics. We\nhave to create the motives, and it is not an impossible task, which will\nact even upon the weak-minded and reckless lowest social stratum.\n\nThese facts have a significance which many of us have failed to realise.\nThe Great War has brought home the gravity of that significance. It has\nbeen the perpetual refrain of the Pan-Germanists for many years that the\nvast and sudden expansion of the German peoples makes necessary a new\nmovement of the German nations into the world and a new enlargement of\nfrontiers, in other words, War. It is not only among the Germans, though\namong them it may have been more conscious, that a similar cause has led\nto the like result. It has ever been so. The expanding nation has always\nbeen a menace to the world and to itself. The arrest of the falling\nbirth-rate, it cannot be too often repeated, would be the arrest of all\ncivilisation and of all humanity.\n\n\n[1] Ralph Thicknesse, _A Year's Journey Through France and Spain_, 1777,\np. 298.\n\n[2] The last twelve words quoted are by Miss Ethel Elderton in an\notherwise sober memoir (_Report on the English Birth-rate_, 1914, p.\n237) which shows that the birth control movement has begun, just where\nwe should expect it to begin, among the better instructed classes.\n\n[3] J.L. Myres, \"The Causes of Rise and Fall in the Population of the\nAncient World,\" Eugenics Review, April, 1915.\n\n[4] Roscher, _Grundlagen der National--konomie_, 23rd ed., 1900, Bk. VI.\n\n[5] G. Lowes Dickinson, _The Civilisation of India, China, and Japan_,\n1914, p. 47.\n\n\n\n\nVII\n\n\nWAR AND DEMOCRACY\n\nWhen we read our newspapers to-day we are constantly met by ingenious\nplans for bringing to an end the activities of Germany after the War.\nGerman military activity, it is universally agreed, must be brought to an\nend; Germany will have no further need of a military system save on the\nmost modest scale. Germany must also be deprived of any colonial empire\nand shut out from eastward expansion. That being the case, Germany no\nlonger needs a fleet, and must be brought back to Bismarck's naval\nattitude. Moreover, the industrial activities of Germany must also be\ndestroyed; the Allied opponents of Germany will henceforth manufacture\nfor themselves or for one another the goods they have hitherto been so\nfoolish as to obtain from Germany, and though this may mean cutting\nthemselves aloof from the country which has hitherto been their own best\ncustomer, that is a sacrifice to be cheerfully borne for the sake of\nprinciple. It is further argued that the world has no need of German\nactivities in science; they are, it appears, much less valuable than we\nhad been led to believe, and in any case no self-respecting people would\nencourage a science tainted by Kultur. The puzzled reader of these\narguments, overlooking the fallacies they contain, may perhaps sometimes\nbe tempted to ask: But what are Germans to be allowed to do? The implied\nanswer is clear: Nothing.\n\nThe writers who urge these arguments with such conviction may be\nsupposed to have an elementary knowledge of the history of the\nGermans. We are concerned, that is to say, with a people which has\ndisplayed an irrepressible energy, in one field or another, ever since\nthe time, more than fifteen hundred years ago, when it excited the\nhorror of the civilised world by sacking Rome. The same energy was\nmanifested, a thousand years later, when the Germans again knocked at\nthe door of Rome and drew away half the world from its allegiance to\nthe Church. Still more recently, in yet other fields of industry and\ncommerce and colonisation, these same Germans have displayed their\nenergy by entering into more or less successful competition with that\n\"Modern Rome,\" as some have termed it, which has its seat in the\nBritish Islands. Here is a people,--still youthful as we count age in\nour European world, for even the Celts had preceded them by nearly a\nthousand years,--which has successfully displayed its explosive or\nmethodical force in the most diverse fields, military, religious,\neconomic. From henceforth it is invited, by an allied army of\nterrified journalists, to expend these stupendous and irresistible\nenergies on just Nothing.\n\nWe know, of course, what would happen were it possible to subject Germany\nto any such process of attempted repression. Whenever an individual or a\nmass of individuals is bidden to do nothing, it merely comes about that\nthe activities aimed at, far from being suppressed, are turned into\nprecisely the direction most unpleasant for the would-be suppressors.\nWhen in 1870 the Germans tried to \"crush\" France, the result was the\nreverse of that intended. The effects of \"crushing\" had been even more\nstartingly reverse, on the other side--and this may furnish us with a\nprecedent--when Napoleon trampled down Germany. Two centuries ago, after\nthe brilliant victories of Marlborough, it was proposed to crush\npermanently the Militarism of France. But, as Swift wrote to Archbishop\nKing just before the Peace of Utrecht, \"limiting France to a certain\nnumber of ships and troops was, I doubt, not to be compassed.\" In spite\nof the exhaustion of France it was not even attempted. In the present\ncase, when the war is over it is probable that Germany will still hold\nsufficiently great pledges to bargain with in safeguarding her own vital\ninterests. If it were not so, if it were possible to inflict permanent\ninjury on Germany, that would be the greatest misfortune that could\nhappen to us; for it is clear that we should then be faced by a yet more\nunited and yet more aggressively military Germany than the world has\nseen.[1] In Germany itself there is no doubt on this point. Germans are\nwell aware that German activities cannot be brought to a sudden full\nstop, and they are also aware that even among Germany's present enemies\nthere are those who after the War will be glad to become her friends. Any\ndoubt or anxiety in the minds of thoughtful Germans is not concerning the\ncontinued existence of German energy in the world, but concerning the\ndirections in which that energy will be exerted.\n\nWhat is Germany's greatest danger? That is the subject of a pamphlet by\nRudolf Goldscheid, of Vienna, now published in Switzerland, with a\npreface by Professor Forel, as originally written a year earlier,\nbecause it is believed that in the interval its conclusions have been\nconfirmed by events.[2] Goldscheid is an independent and penetrating\nthinker in the economic field, and the author of a book on the\nprinciples of Social Biology (_Hoeherentwicklung und Menschenoekonomie_)\nwhich has been described by an English critic as the ablest defence of\nSocialism yet written. By the nature of his studies he is concerned\nwith problems of human rather than merely national development, but he\nardently desires the welfare of Germany, and is anxious that that\nwelfare shall be on the soundest and most democratic basis. After the\nWar, he says, there must necessarily be a tendency to approximate\nbetween the Central Powers and one or other of their present foes.\nIt is clear (though this point is not discussed) that Italy, whose\npresence in the Triple Alliance was artificial, will not return, while\nFrench resentment at German devastation is far too great to be appeased\nfor a long period to come. There remain, therefore, Russia and England.\nAfter the War German interests and German sympathies must gravitate\neither eastwards towards Russia or westwards towards England. Which is\nit to be?\n\nThere are many reasons why Germany should gravitate towards Russia.\nSuch a movement was indeed already in active progress before the war,\nnotwithstanding Russia's alliance with France, and may easily become\nyet more active after the war, when it is likely that the bonds between\nRussia and France may grow weaker, and when it is possible that the\nGermans, with their immense industry, economy and recuperative power,\nmay prove to be in the best position--unless America cuts in--to\nfinance Russia. Industrially Russia offers a vast field for German\nenterprise which no other country can well snatch away, and German is\nalready to some extent the commercial language of Russia.[3]\n\nPolitically, moreover, a close understanding between the two supreme\nautocratic and anti-democratic powers of Europe is of the greatest mutual\nbenefit, for any democratic movement within the borders of either Power\nis highly inconvenient to the other, so that it is to the advantage of\nboth to stimulate each other in the task of repression.[4] It is this\naspect of the approximation which arouses Goldscheid's alarm. It is\nmainly on this ground that he advocates a counter-balancing approximation\nbetween Germany and England which would lay Germany open to the West and\nserve to develop her latent democratic tendencies. He admits that at some\npoints the interests of Germany and England run counter to each other,\nbut at yet a greater number of points their interests are common. It is\nonly by the development of these common interests, and the consequent\npermeation of Germany by democratic English ideas, that Goldscheid sees\nany salvation from Czarism, for that is \"Germany's greatest danger,\" and\nat the same time the greatest danger to Europe.\n\nThat is Goldscheid's point of view. Our English point of view is\nnecessarily somewhat different. With our politically democratic\ntendencies we see very little difference between Russia and Prussia. As\nthey are at present constituted, we have no wish to be in very close\npolitical intimacy with either. It so happens, indeed, that, for the\nmoment, the chances of fellowship in War have brought us into a condition\nof almost sentimental sympathy with the Russian people, such as has never\nexisted among us before. But this sympathy, amply justified, as all who\nknow Russia agree, is exclusively with the Russian people. It leaves the\nRussian Government, the Russian bureaucracy, the Russian political\nsystem, all that Goldscheid concentrates into the term \"Czarism,\"\nseverely alone. Our hostility to these may be for the moment latent, but\nit is as profound as it ever was. Czarism is even more remote from our\nsympathies than Kaiserism. All that has happened is that we cherish the\npious hope that Russia is becoming converted to our own ideas on these\npoints, although there is not the smallest item of solid fact to support\nthat hope. Otherwise, Russian oppression of the Finns is just as odious\nto us as Prussian oppression of the Poles, and Russian persecution of\nLiberals as alien as German persecution of War-prisoners.[5] Our future\npolicy, in the opinion of many, should, however, be to isolate Germany as\ncompletely as possible from English influence and to cultivate closer\nrelations with Russia.[6] Such a policy, Goldscheid argues, will defeat\nits own ends. The more stringently England holds aloof from Germany the\nmore anxiously will Germany cultivate good relationships with Russia.\nSuch relationships, as we know, are easy to cultivate, because they are\nmuch in the interests of both countries which possess so large an extent\nof common frontier and so admirably supply each other's needs; it may be\nadded also that the Russian commercial world is showing no keen desire to\nenter into close relations with England. Moreover, after the War, we may\nexpect a weakening of French influence in Russia, for that influence was\nlargely based on French gold, and a France no longer able or willing to\nfinance Russia would no longer possess a strong hold over Russia. A\nRusso-German understanding, difficult to prevent in any case, is inimical\nto the interests of England, but it would be rendered inevitable by an\nattempt on the part of England to isolate Germany.[7]\n\nSuch an attempt could not be carried out completely and would break down\non its weakest side, which is the East. So that the way lies open to a\nLeague of the Three Kaisers, the Dreikaiserbuendnis which would form a\ngreat island fortress of militarism and reaction amid the surrounding sea\nof democracy, able to repress those immense possibilities of progress\nwithin its own walls which would have been liberated by contact with the\nvital currents outside.\n\nSo long as the War lasts it is the interest of England to strike Germany\nand to strike hard. That is here assumed as certain. But when the War\nis over, it will no longer be in the interests of England, it will\nindeed be directly contrary to those interests, to continue cultivating\nhostility, provided, that is, that no rankling wounds are left. The\nfatal mistake of Bismarck in annexing Alsace-Lorraine introduced a\npoison into the European organism which is working still. But the\nRusso-Japanese War produced a more amicable understanding than had\nexisted before, and the Boer War led to still more intimate\nrelationships between the belligerents. It may be thought that the\nimpression in England of German \"frightfulness,\" and in Germany of\nEnglish \"treachery,\" may prove ineffaceable. But the Germans have been\nconsidered atrocious and the English perfidious for a long time past,\nyet that has not prevented English and Germans fighting side by side at\nWaterloo and on many another field; nor has it stood in the way of\nGerman worship of the quintessential Englishman, Shakespeare, nor\nEnglish homage to the quintessential German Goethe.\n\nThe question of the future relations of England and Germany may,\nindeed, be said to lie on a higher plane than that of interest and\npolicy, vitally urgent as their claims may be. It is the merit of\nGoldscheid's little book that--with faith in a future United States of\nEurope in which every country would develop its own peculiar aptitudes\nfreely and harmoniously--he is able to look at the War from that\nEuropean standpoint which is so rarely attained in England. He sees\nthat more is at stake than a mere question of national rivalries; that\ndemocracy is at stake, and the whole future direction of civilisation.\nHe looks beyond the enmities of the moment, and he knows that, unless\nwe look beyond them, we not only condemn Europe to the prospect of\nunending war, we do more: we ensure the triumph of Reaction and the\ndestruction of Democracy. \"War and Reaction are brethren\"; on that\npoint Goldscheid is very sure, and he foretells and laments the\ntemporary \"demolition of Democracy\" in England. We have only too much\nreason to believe his prophetic words, for since he wrote we have had\na Coalition Government which is predominantly democratic, Liberal and\nLabour, and yet has been fatally impelled towards reaction and\nautocracy.[8] That the impulse is really fatal and inevitable we cannot\ndoubt, for we see exactly the same movement in France, and even in\nRussia, where it might seem that reaction has so few triumphs to achieve.\n\"The blood of the battlefield is the stream that drives the mills of\nReaction.\" The elementary and fundamental fact that in Democracy the\nofficers obey the men, while in Militarism the men obey the officers,\nis the key to the whole situation. We see at once why all reactionaries\nare on the side of war and a military basis of society. The fate of\ndemocracy in Europe hangs on this question of adequate pacification.\n\"Democratisation and Pacification march side by side.\"[9] Unless we\nrealise that fact we are not competent to decide on a sound European\npolicy. For there is an intimate connection between a country's external\npolicy and its internal policy. An internal reactionary policy means an\nexternal aggressive policy. To shut out English influence from Germany,\nto fortify German Junkerism and Militarism, to drive Germany into the\narms of a yet more reactionary Russia, is to create a perpetual menace,\nalike to peace and to democracy, which involves the arrest of\ncivilisation. However magnanimous the task may seem to some, it is not\nonly the interest of England, but England's duty to Europe, to take the\ninitiative in preparing the ground for a clear and good understanding\nwith Germany. It is, moreover, only through England that France can be\nbrought into harmonious relations with Germany, and when Russia then\napproaches her neighbour it will be in sympathy with her more progressive\nWestern Allies and not in reactionary response to a reactionary Germany.\nIt is along such lines as these that amid the confusion of the present we\nmay catch a glimpse of the Europe of the future.\n\nWe have to remember that, as Goldscheid reminds us, this War is making\nall of us into citizens of the world. A world-wide outlook can no longer\nbe reserved merely for philosophers. Some of the old bridges, it is true,\nhave been washed away, but on every side walls are falling, and the petty\nfears and rivalries of European nations begin to look worse than trivial\nin the face of greater dangers. As our eyes begin to be opened we see\nEurope lying between the nether millstone of Asia and the upper millstone\nof America. It is not by constituting themselves a Mutual Suicide Club\nthat the nations of Europe will avoid that peril.[10] A wise and\nfar-seeing world-policy can alone avail, and the enemies of to-day will\nsee themselves compelled, even by the mere logic of events, to join hands\nto-morrow lest a worse fate befall them. In so doing they may not only\nescape possible destruction, but they will be taking the greatest step\never taken in the organisation of the world. Which nation is to assume\nthe initiative in such combined organisation? That remains the fateful\nquestion for Democracy.\n\n\n[1] Treitschke in his _History_ (Bk. I., Ch. III.) has well described\n\"the elemental hatred which foreign injury pours into the veins of our\ngood-natured people, for ever pursued by the question: 'Art thou yet on\nthy feet, Germania? Is the day of thy revenge at hand!'\"\n\n[2] Rudolf Goldscheid, _Deutschlands Groesste Gefahr_, Institut Orell\nFuessli, Zuerich, 1916.\n\n[3] One may remark that up to the outbreak of war fifty per cent. of\nthe import trade of Russia has been with Germany. To suppose that that\nimmense volume of trade can suddenly be transferred after the war from\na neighbouring country which has intelligently and systematically\nadapted itself to its requirements to a remote country which has never\nshown the slightest aptitude to meet those requirements argues a\nsimplicity of mind which in itself may be charming, but when translated\ninto practical affairs it is stupendous folly.\n\n[4] Sir Valentine Chirol remarks of Bismarck, in an Oxford Pamphlet on\n\"Germany and the Fear of Russia\":--\"Friendship with Russia was one of\nthe cardinal principles of his foreign policy, and one thing he always\nrelied upon to make Russia amenable to German influence was that she\nshould never succeed in healing the Polish sore.\"\n\n[5] In making these observations on the Russians and the Prussians, I\ndo not, of course, overlook the fact that all nations, like\nindividuals,\n\n    \"Compound for sins they are inclined to\n    By damning those they have no mind to,\"\n\nand the English treatment of the conscientious objector in the Great\nWar has been just as odious as Russian treatment of the Finns or\nPrussian treatment of war prisoners, and even more foolish, since it\nstrikes at our own most cherished principles.\n\n[6] There is, indeed, another school which would like to shut off all\nforeign countries by a tariff wall and make the British Empire mutually\nself-supporting, on the economic basis adopted by those three old ladies\nin decayed circumstances who subsisted by taking tea in one another's\nhouses.\n\n[7] Even if partially successful, as has lately been pointed out, the\ngreater the financial depression of Germany the greater would be the\nadvantage to Russia of doing business with Germany.\n\n[8] It may be proper to point out that I by no means wish to imply\nthat democracy is necessarily the ultimate and most desirable form of\npolitical society, but merely that it is a necessary stage for those\npeoples that have not yet reached it. Even Treitschke in his famous\n_History_, while idealising the Prussian State, always assumes that\nmovement towards democracy is beneficial progress. For the larger\nquestion of the comparative merits of the different forms of political\nsociety, see an admirable little book by C. Delisle Burns, _Political\nIdeals_ (1915). And see also the searching study, _Political Parties_\n(English translation, 1915), by Robert Michels, who, while accepting\ndemocracy as the highest political form, argues that practically it\nalways works out as oligarchy.\n\n[9] Professor D.S. Jordan has quoted the letter of a German officer to\na friend in Roumania (published in the Bucharest _Adverul_, 21 Aug.,\n1915): \"How difficult it was to convince our Emperor that the moment had\narrived for letting loose the war, otherwise Pacifism, Internationalism,\nAnti-Militarism, and so many other noxious weeds would have infected our\nstupid people. That would have been the end of our dazzling nobility. We\nhave everything to gain by the war, and all the chimeras and stupidities\nof democracy will be chased from the world for an infinite time.\"\n\n[10] \"Let us be patient,\" a Japanese is reported to have said lately,\n\"until Europe has completed her _hara-kiri_.\"\n\n\n\n\nVIII\n\n\nFEMINISM AND MASCULINISM\n\nDuring more than a century we have seen the slow but steady growth of the\ngreat Women's movement, of the movement of Feminism in the wide sense of\nthat term. The conquests of this movement have sometimes been described\nby rhetorical feminists as triumphs over \"Man.\" That is scarcely true.\nThe champions of Feminism have nearly as often been men as women, and the\nforces of Anti-feminism have been the vague massive inert forces of an\norder which had indeed made the world in an undue degree \"a man's world,\"\nbut unconsciously and involuntarily, and by an instrumentation which was\nfeminine as well as masculine. The advocates of Woman's Rights have\nseldom been met by the charge that they were unjustly encroaching on the\nRights of Man. Feminism has never encountered an aggressive and\nself-conscious Masculinism.\n\nNow, however, when the claims of Feminism are becoming practically\nrecognised in our social life, and some of its largest demands are being\ngranted, it is interesting to observe the appearance of a new attitude.\nWe are, for the first time, beginning to hear of \"Masculinism.\" Just as\nFeminism represents the affirmation of neglected rights and functions of\nWomanhood, so Masculinism represents the assertion of the rights and\nfunctions of Manhood which, it is supposed, the rising tide of Feminism\nthreatens to submerge.\n\nThose who proclaim the necessity of an assertion of the rights of\nMasculinism usually hold up America as an awful example of the triumph of\nFeminism. Thus Fritz Voechting in a book published in Germany, \"On the\nAmerican Cult of Woman,\" is appalled by what he sees in the United\nStates. To him it is \"the American danger,\" and he thinks it may be\ntraced partly to the influence of the matriarchal system of the American\nIndians on the early European invaders and partly to the effects of\nco-education in undermining the fundamental conceptions of feminine\nsubordination. This state of things is so terrible to the German mind,\nwhich has a constitutional bias to masculinism, that to Herr Voechting\nAmerica seems a land where all the privileges have been captured by Woman\nand nothing is left to Man, but, like a good little boy, to be seen and\nnot heard. That is a slight exaggeration, as other Germans, even since\nthe War, have pointed out in German periodicals. Even if it were true,\nhowever, as a German Feminist has remarked, it would still be a pleasant\nvariation from a rule we are so familiar with in the Old World. That it\nshould be put forward at all indicates the growing perception of a\ncleavage between the claims of Masculinism and the claims of Feminism.\n\nIt is not altogether easy at present to ascertain whom we are to\nrecognise as the champions and representatives of Masculinism. Various\nnotable figures are mentioned, from Nietzsche to Mr. Theodore Dreiser.\nNietzsche, however, can scarcely be regarded as in all respects an\nopponent to Feminism, and some prominent feminists even count themselves\nhis disciples. One may also feel doubtful whether Mr. Dreiser feels\nhimself called upon to put on the armour of masculinism and play the part\nassigned to him. Another distinguished novelist, Mr. Robert Herrick,\nwhose name has been mentioned in this connection, is probably too\nwell-balanced, too comprehensive in his outlook, to be fairly claimed as\na banner-bearer of masculinism. The name of Strindberg is most often\nmentioned, but surely very unfortunately. However great Strindberg's\ngenius, and however acute and virulent his analysis of woman, Strindberg\nwith his pronounced morbidity and sensitive fragility seems a very\nunhappy figure to put forward as the ideal representative of the virtues\nof masculinity. Much the same may be said of Weininger. The name of Mr.\nBelfort Bax, once associated with William Morris in the Socialistic\ncampaign, may fairly be mentioned as a pioneer in this field. For many\nyears he has protested vigorously against the encroachment of Feminism,\nand pointed out the various privileges, social and legal, which are\npossessed by women to the disadvantage of men. But although he is a\ndistinguished student of philosophy, it can scarcely be said that Mr. Bax\nhas clearly presented in any wide philosophic manner the demands of the\nmasculinistic spirit or definitely grasped the contest between Feminism\nand Masculinism. The name of William Morris would be an inspiring\nbattle-cry if it could be fairly raised on the side of Masculinism.\nUnfortunately, however, the masculine figures scarcely seem eager to put\non the armour of Masculinism. They are far too sensitive to the charm of\nWomanhood ever to rank themselves actively in any anti-feministic party.\nAt the most they remain neutral.\n\nThus it is that the new movement cannot yet be regarded as organised.\nThere is, however, a temptation for those among us who have all their\nlives been working in the cause of Feminism to belittle the future\npossibilities of Masculinism. There can be no doubt that all civilisation\nis now, and always has been to some extent, on the side of Feminism.\nWherever a great development of civilisation has occurred--whether in\nancient Egypt, or in later Rome, or in eighteenth-century France--there\nthe influence of woman has prevailed, while laws and social institutions\nhave taken on a character favourable to women. The whole current of\ncivilisation tends to deprive men of the privileges which belong to brute\nforce, and to confer on them the qualities which in ruder societies are\nespecially associated with women. Whenever, as in the present great\nEuropean War, brute force becomes temporarily predominant, the causes\nassociated with Feminism are roughly pushed into the background. It is,\nindeed, the War which gives a new actuality to this question. War has\nalways been regarded as the special and peculiar province of Man, indeed,\nthe sacred refuge of the masculine spirit and the ultimate appeal in\nhuman affairs. That is not the view of Feminism, nor yet the standpoint\nof Eugenics. Yet, to-day, in spite of all our homage to Feminism and\nEugenics, we witness the greatest war of the world. It is an instructive\nspectacle from our present point of view. We realise, for one thing, how\nfutile it is for Feminism to adopt the garb of masculine militancy. The\nmilitancy of the Suffragettes, which looked so brave and imposing in\ntimes of peace, disappeared like child's play at the first touch of real\nmilitancy. That was patriotic of the Suffragettes, no doubt; but it was\nalso a necessary measure of self-preservation, for non-combatants who\ncarry bombs about in time of war, when armed sentries are swarming\neverywhere, are not likely to have much time for hunger-striking.\n\nWe witness another feature of war which has a bearing on Eugenics. It is\nsometimes said that war is necessary for the preservation of heroic and\nvirile qualities which, without war and the cultivation of military\nideals, would be lost to the race, and that so the race would degenerate.\nTo-day France, which is the chief seat of anti-Militarism, and Belgium, a\nland of peaceful industrialism which had no military service until a few\nyears ago, and England, which has always been content to possess a\ncontemptible little army, and Russia whose popular ideals are humane and\nmystical, have sent to the front swarms of professional men and clerks\nand artisans and peasants who had never occupied themselves with war at\nall. Yet these men have proved as heroic and even as skilful in the game\nof war as the men of Germany, where war is idolised and where the\npractice of military virtues and military exercises is regarded as the\nhighest function alike of the individual and of the State. We see that we\nneed not any longer worry over the possible extinction of these heroic\nqualities. What we may more profitably worry over is the question whether\nthere is not some higher and nobler way of employing them than in the\ndestruction of the finest fruits of civilisation and the slaughter of\nthose very stocks on which Eugenics mainly relies for its materials.\n\nWe can also realise to-day that war is not only an opportunity for the\nexercise of virtues. It is also an opportunity for the exercise of vices.\n\"War is Hell\" said Sherman, and that is the opinion of most great\nreflective soldiers. We see that there is nothing too brutal, too cruel,\ntoo cowardly, too mean, and too filthy for some, at all events, of modern\ncivilised troops to commit, whether by, or against, the orders of their\nofficers. In France, a few months before the present War, I found myself\nin a railway train at Laon with two or three soldiers; a young woman came\nto the carriage door, but, seeing the soldiers, she passed on; they were\ndecent, well-behaved men, and one of them remarked, with a smile, on the\nsuspicion which the military costume arouses in women. Perhaps, however,\nit is a suspicion that is firmly based on ancient traditions. There is\nthe fatally seamy side of be-praised Militarism, and there Feminism has a\ntriumphant argument.\n\nIn this connection I may allude in passing to a little conflict between\nMasculinism and Feminism which has lately taken place in Germany.\nGermany, as we know, is the country where the claims of Masculinism are\nmost loudly asserted, and those of Feminism treated with most contempt.\nIt is the country where the ideals of men and of women are in sharpest\nconflict. There has been a great outcry among men in Germany against the\n\"treachery\" and \"unworthiness\" of German women in bestowing chocolates\nand flowers on the prisoners, as well as doing other little services for\nthem. The attitude towards prisoners approved by the men--one trusts it\nis not to be regarded as a characteristic outcome of Masculinism--is that\nof petty insults, of spiteful cruelty, and mean deprivations. Dr. Helene\nStoecker, a prominent leader of the more advanced band of German\nFeminists, has lately published a protest against this treatment of\nenemies who are helpless, unarmed, and often wounded--based, not on\nsentiment, but on the highest and most rational grounds--which is an\nhonour to German women and to their Feminist leaders.[1]\n\nTaken altogether, it seems probable that when this most stupendous of\nwars is ended, it will be felt--not only from the side of Feminism, but\neven of Masculinism,--that War is merely an eruption of ancient barbarism\nwhich in its present virulent forms would not have been tolerated even by\nsavages. Such methods are hopelessly out of date in days when wars may be\nengineered by a small clique of ambitious politicians and self-interested\ncapitalists, while whole nations fight, with or without enthusiasm,\nmerely because they have no choice in the matter. All the powers of\ncivilisation are working towards the elimination of wars. In the future,\nit seems evident, militarism will not furnish the basis for the\nmasculinistic spirit. It must seek other supports.\n\nThat is what will probably happen. We must expect that the increasing\npower of women and of the feminine influence will be met by a more\nemphatic and a more rational assertion of the qualities of men and the\nmasculine spirit in life. It was unjust and unreasonable to subject women\nto conditions that were primarily made by men and for men. It would be\nequally unjust and unreasonable to expect men to confine their activities\nwithin limits which are more and more becoming adjusted to feminine\npreferences and feminine capacities. We are now learning to realise that\nthe _tertiary_ physical, and psychic sexual differences--those\ndistinctions which are only found on the average, but on the average are\nconstant[2]--are very profound and very subtle. A man is a man\nthroughout, a woman is a woman throughout, and that difference is\nmanifest in all the energies of body and soul. The modern doctrine of the\ninternal secretions--the hormones which are the intimate stimulants to\nphysical and psychic activity in the organism--makes clear to us one of\nthe deepest and most all-pervading sources of this difference between men\nand women. The hormonic balance in men and women is unlike; the\ngenerative ferments of the ductless glands work to different ends.[3]\nMasculine qualities and feminine qualities are fundamentally and\neternally distinct and incommensurate. Energy, struggle, daring,\ninitiative, originality, and independence, even though sometimes combined\nwith rashness, extravagance, and defect, seem likely to remain qualities\nin which men--_on the average_, it must be remembered--will be more\nconspicuous than women. Their manifestation will resist the efforts put\nforth to constrain them by the feminising influences of life.\n\nSuch considerations have a real bearing on the problem of Eugenics. As\nI view that problem, it is first of all concerned, in part with the\nacquisition of scientific knowledge concerning heredity and the\ninfluences which affect heredity; in part with the establishment of sound\nideals of the types which the society of the future demands for its great\ntasks; and in part--perhaps even in chief part--with the acquisition of a\nsense of personal responsibility. Eugenic legislation is a secondary\nmatter which cannot come at the beginning. It cannot come before our\nknowledge is firmly based and widely diffused; it cannot come until we\nare clear as to the ideals which we wish to see embodied in human\ncharacter and human action; it cannot come until the sense of personal\nresponsibility towards the race is so widely spread throughout the\ncommunity that its absence is universally felt to be either a crime or a\ndisease.\n\nI fear that point of view is not always accepted in England and still\nless in America. It is widely held throughout the world that America is\nnot only the land of Feminism, but the land in which laws are passed on\nevery possible subject, and with considerable indifference as to whether\nthey are carried out, or even whether they could be carried out. This\ntendency is certainly well illustrated by eugenic legislation in the\nUnited States. In the single point of sterilisation for eugenic ends--and\nI select a point which is admirable in itself and for which legislation\nis perhaps desirable--at least twelve States have passed laws. Yet most\nof these laws are a dead letter; every one of them is by the best experts\nconsidered at some point unwise; and the remarkable fact remains that the\ntotal number of eugenical sterilising operations performed in the States\n_without any law at all_ is greater than the total of those performed\nunder the laws. So that the laws really seem to have themselves a\nsterilising effect on a most useful eugenic operation.[4]\n\nI refrain from mentioning the muddles and undesigned evils produced by\nother legislation of a much less admirable nature.[5] But I may perhaps\nbe allowed to mention that it has seemed to some observers that there is\na connection between the Feminism of America and the American mania for\nhasty laws which will not, and often cannot, be carried out in practice.\nCertainly there is no reason to suppose that women are firmly\nantagonistic to such legislation. Nice, pretty, virtuous little laws,\ncomplete in every detail, seem to appeal irresistibly to the feminine\nmind. (And, of course, many men have feminine minds.) It is true that\nsuch laws are only meant for show. But then women are so accustomed to\nthings that are only meant for show, and are well aware that if one\nattempted to use such things they would fall to pieces at once.\n\nHowever that may be, we shall probably find at last that we must fall\nback on the ancient truth that no external regulation, however pretty and\nplausible, will suffice to lead men and women to the goal of any higher\nsocial end. We must realise that there can be no sure guide to fine\nliving save that which comes from within, and is supported by the firmly\ncultivated sense of personal responsibility. Our prayer must still be the\nsimple, old-fashioned prayer of the Psalmist: \"Create in me a clean\nheart, O God\"--and to Hell with your laws!\n\nIn other words, our aim must be to evolve a social order in which the\nsense of freedom and the sense of responsibility are both carried to the\nhighest point, and that is impossible by the aid of measures which are\nonly beneficial for the children of Perdition. That there are such\nbeings, incapable alike either of freedom or of responsibility, we have\nto recognise. It is our business to care for them--until with the help of\neugenics we can in some degree extinguish their stocks--in such refuges\nand reformatories as may be found desirable. But it is not our business\nto treat the whole world as a refuge and a reformatory. That is fatal to\nhuman freedom and fatal to human responsibility. By all means provide the\nhalt and the lame with crutches. But do not insist that the sound and the\nrobust shall never stir abroad without crutches. The result will only be\nthat we shall all become more or less halt and lame.\n\nIt is only by such a method as this--by segregating the hopelessly feeble\nmembers of society and by allowing the others to take all the risks of\ntheir freedom and responsibility even though we strongly disapprove--that\nwe can look for the coming of a better world. It is only by such a method\nas this that we can afford to give scope to all those varying and\never-contradictory activities which go to the making of any world worth\nliving in. For Conflict, even the conflict of ideals, is a part of all\nvital progress, and each party to the conflict needs free play if that\nconflict is to yield us any profit. That is why Masculinists have no\nright to impede the play of Feminism, and Feminists no right to impede\nthe play of Masculinism. The fundamental qualities of Man, equally with\nthe fundamental qualities of Woman, are for ever needed in any harmonious\ncivilisation. There is a place for Masculinism as well as a place for\nFeminism. From the highest standpoint there is not really any conflict at\nall. They alike serve the large cause of Humanity, which equally includes\nthem both.\n\n\n[1] \"Wuerdelose Weiber,\" _Die Neue Generation_, Aug.-Sept., 1914.\n\n[2] Havelock Ellis, _Man and Woman_, fifth ed., 1914, p. 21.\n\n[3] The conception of sexuality as dependent on the combined operation of\nvarious internal ductless glands, and not on the sexual glands proper\nalone, has been especially worked out by Professor W. Blair Bell, _The\nSex Complex_, 1916.\n\n[4] H.H. Laughlin, _The Legal, Legislative, and Administrative Aspects of\nSterilisation_, Eugenics Record Office Bulletin, No. 1, OB, 1914.\n\n[5] I have discussed these already in a chapter of my book, _The Task of\nSocial Hygiene_.\n\n\n\n\nIX\n\n\nTHE MENTAL DIFFERENCES OF MEN AND WOMEN\n\nThe Great War, which has changed so many things, has nowhere effected\na greater change than in the sphere of women's activities. In all the\nbelligerent countries women have been called upon to undertake work\nwhich they had never been offered before. Europe has thus become a great\nexperimental laboratory for testing the aptitudes of women. The results\nof these tests, as they are slowly realised, cannot fail to have\npermanent effects on the sexual division of labour. It is still too early\nto speak confidently as to what those effects will be. But we may be\ncertain that, whatever they are, they can only spring from deep-lying\nnatural distinctions.\n\nThe differences between the minds of men and the minds of women are,\nindeed, presented to all of us every day. It should, therefore, we\nmight imagine, be one of the easiest of tasks to ascertain what they\nare. And yet there are few matters on which such contradictory and often\nextravagant opinions are maintained. For many people the question has not\narisen; there are no mental differences, they seem to take for granted,\nbetween men and women. For others the mental superiority of man at every\npoint is an unquestionable article of faith, though they may not always\ngo so far as to agree with the German doctor, Mobius, who boldly wrote a\nbook on \"The Physiological Weak-mindedness of Women.\" For others, again,\nthe predominance of men is an accident, due to the influences of brute\nforce; let the intelligence of women have freer play and the world\ngenerally will be straightened out.\n\nIn these conflicting attitudes we may trace not only the confidence we\nare all apt to feel in our intimate knowledge of a familiar subject we\nhave never studied, but also the inevitable influence of sexual bias. Of\nsuch bias there is more than one kind. There is the egoistic bias by\nwhich we are led to regard our own sex as naturally better than any other\ncould be, and there is the altruistic bias by which we are led to find a\ncharming and mysterious superiority in the opposite sex. These different\nkinds of sexual bias act with varying force in particular cases; it is\nusually necessary to allow for them.\n\nNotwithstanding the fantastic divergencies of opinion on this matter, it\nseems not impossible to place the question on a fairly sound and rational\nbase. In so complex a question there must always be room for some\nvariations of individual opinion, for no two persons can approach the\nconsideration of it with quite the same prepossessions, or with quite the\nsame experience.\n\nAt the outset there is one great fundamental fact always to be borne\nin mind: the difference of the sexes in physical organisation. That we\nmay term the _biological_ factor in determining the sexual mental\ndifferences. A strong body does not involve a strong brain nor a weak\nbody a weak brain; but there is still an intimate connection between the\norganisation of the body generally and the organisation of the brain,\nwhich may be regarded as an executive assemblage of delegates from all\nparts of the body. Fundamental differences in the organisation of the\nbody cannot fail to involve differences in the nervous system generally,\nand especially in that supreme collection of nervous ganglia which we\nterm the brain. In this way the special adaptation of woman's body to the\nexercise of maternity, with the presence of special organs and glands\nsubservient to that object, and without any important equivalents in\nman's body, cannot fail to affect the brain. We now know that the\norganism is largely under the control of a number of internal secretions\nor hormones, which work together harmoniously in normal persons,\ninfluencing body and mind, but are liable to disturbance, and are\ndifferently balanced and with a different action in the two sexes.[1] It\nis not, we must remember, by any means altogether the exercise of the\nmaternal function which causes the difference; the organs and aptitudes\nare equally present even if the function is not exercised, so that a\nwoman cannot make herself a man by refraining from childbearing.\n\nIn another way this biological factor makes itself felt, and that is in\nthe differences in the muscular systems of men and women. These we must\nalso consider fundamental. Although the extreme muscular weakness of\naverage civilised women as compared to civilised men is certainly\nartificial and easily possible to remove by training, yet even in\nsavages, among whom the women do most of the muscular work, they seldom\nequal or exceed the men in strength; any superiority, when it exists,\nbeing mainly shown in such passive forms of exertion as bearing burdens.\nIn civilisation, even under the influence of careful athletic training,\nwomen are unable to compete muscularly with men; and it is a significant\nfact that on the variety stage there are very few \"strong women.\" It\nwould seem that the difficulty in developing great muscular strength in\nwomen is connected with the special adaptation of woman's form and\norganisation to the maternal function. But whatever the cause may be, the\nresulting difference is one which has a very real bearing on the mental\ndistinctions of men and women. It is well ascertained that what we call\n\"mental\" fatigue expresses itself physiologically in the same bodily\nmanifestation as muscular fatigue. The avocations which we commonly\nconsider mental are at the same time muscular; and even the sensory\norgans, like the eye, are largely muscular. It is commonly found in\nvarious great business departments where men and women may be said to\nwork more or less side by side that the work of women is less valuable,\nlargely because they are not able to bear additional strain; under\npressure of extra work they give in before men do. It is noteworthy that\nthe claims for sick benefit made by women under the National Insurance\nSystem in England have proved much greater (even three times greater)\nthan the actuaries anticipated beforehand; while the Sick Insurance\nSocieties of Germany, France, Austria, and Switzerland also report that\nwomen are ill oftener and for longer periods than men. Largely, no doubt,\nthat is due to the special strain and the rigid monotony of our modern\nindustrial system, but not entirely. Nearly two hundred years ago (in\n1729) Swift wrote of women to Bolingbroke: \"I protest I never knew a very\ndeserving person of that sex who had not too much reason to complain of\nill-health.\" The regulations of the world have been mainly made by men on\nthe instinctive basis of their own needs, and until women have a large\npart in making them on the basis of their needs, women are not likely to\nbe so healthy as men.\n\nThis by no means necessarily implies any mental inferiority; it is much\nmore the result of muscular inferiority. Even in the arts muscular\nqualities count for much and are often essential, since a solid muscular\nsystem is needed even for very delicate actions; the arts of design\ndemand muscular qualities; to play the violin is a muscular strain, and\nonly a robust woman can become a famous singer.\n\nThe greater precocity of girls is another aspect of the biological factor\nin sexual mental differences. It is a psychic as well as a physical fact.\nThis has been shown conclusively by careful investigation in many parts\nof the civilised world and notably in America, where the school system\nrenders such sexual comparison easy and reliable at all ages. There can\nnow be no doubt that a girl at, let us say, the age of fourteen is on the\naverage taller and heavier than a boy at the same age, though the degrees\nof this difference and the precise age at which it occurs vary with the\nindividual and the race. Corresponding to this is a mental difference; in\nmany branches of study, though not all, the girl of fourteen is superior\nto the boy, quicker, more intelligent, gifted with a better memory.\nPrecocity, however, is a quality of dubious virtue. It is frequently\nfound, indeed, in men of the highest genius; but, on the other hand, it\nis found among animals and among savages, and is here of no good augury.\nMany observers of the lower races have noted how the child is highly\nintelligent and well disposed, but seems to degenerate as he grows older;\nIn the comparison of girls and boys, both as regards physical and mental\nqualities, it is constantly found that while the girls hold their own,\nand in many respects more than hold their own, with boys up to the age of\nfifteen or sixteen, after that the girls remain almost or quite\nstationary, while in the boys the curve of progress is continued without\ninterruption. Some people have argued, hypothetically, that the greater\nprecocity of girls is an artificial product of civilisation, due to the\nconfined life of girls, produced, as it were, by the artificial\noverheating of the system in the hothouse of the home. This is a mistake.\nThe same precocity of girls appears to exist even among the uncivilised,\nand independently of the special circumstances of life. It is even found\namong animals also, and is said to be notably obvious in giraffes. It\nwill hardly be argued that the female giraffe leads a more confined and\ndomestic life than her brother.\n\nYet another aspect of the biological factor is to be found in the bearing\nof heredity on this question. To judge by the statements that one\nsometimes sees, men and women might be two distinct species, separately\npropagated. The conviction of some men that women are not fitted to\nexercise various social and political duties, and the conviction of some\nwomen that men are a morally inferior sex, are both alike absurd, for\nthey both rest on the assumption that women do not inherit from their\nfathers, nor men from their mothers. Nothing is more certain than\nthat--when, of course, we put aside the sexual characters and the special\nqualities associated with those characters--men and women, on the\naverage, inherit equally from both of their parents, allowing for the\nfact that that heredity is controlled and modified by the special\norganisation of each sex. There are, indeed, various laws of heredity\nwhich qualify this statement, and notably the tendency whereby extremes\nof variation are more common in the male sex--so that genius and idiocy\nare alike more prevalent in men. But, on the whole, there can be no doubt\nthat the qualities of a man or of a woman are a more or less varied\nmixture of those of both parents; and, even when there is no blending,\nboth parents are almost equally likely to be influential in heredity. The\ngood qualities of the one parent will therefore benefit the child of the\nopposite sex, and the bad qualities will equally be transmitted to the\noffspring of opposite sex.\n\nThere is another element in the settlement of this question which may\nalso be fairly called objective, and that is the _historical_ factor. We\nare prone to believe that the particular status of the sexes that\nprevails among ourselves corresponds to a universal and unchangeable\norder of things. In reality this is far from being the case. It may,\nindeed, be truly said that there is no kind of social position, no sort\nof avocation, public or domestic, among ourselves exclusively\nappertaining to one sex, which has not at some time or in some part of\nthe world belonged to the opposite sex, and with the most excellent\nresults. We regard it as alone right and proper for a man to take the\ninitiative in courtship, yet among the Papuans of New Guinea a man would\nthink it indecorous and ridiculous to court a girl; it was the girl's\nprivilege to take the initiative in this matter, and she exercised it\nwith delicacy and skill and the best moral results, until the shocked\nmissionaries upset the native system and unintentionally introduced\nlooser ways. There is, again, no implement which we regard as so\npeculiarly and exclusively feminine as the needle. Yet in some parts of\nAfrica a woman never touches a needle; that is man's work, and a wife who\ncan show a neglected rent in her petticoat is even considered to have a\nfair claim for a divorce. Innumerable similar examples appear when we\nconsider the human species in time and space. The historical aspect of\nthis matter may thus be said in some degree to counterbalance the\nbiological aspect. If the fundamental constitution of the sexes renders\ntheir mental characters necessarily different, the difference is still\nnot so pronounced as to prevent one sex sometimes playing effectively the\nparts which are generally played by the other sex.\n\nIt is not necessary to go outside the white European race to find\nevidences of the reality of this historical factor of the question before\nus. It would appear that at the dawn of European civilisation women were\ntaking a leading part in the evolution of human progress. Various\nsurvivals which are enshrined in the myths and legends of classic\nantiquity show us the most ancient deities as goddesses; and, moreover,\nwe encounter the significant fact that at the origin nearly all the arts\nand industries were presided over by female, not by male, deities. In\nGreece, as well as in Asia Minor, India, and Egypt, as Paul Lafargue has\npointed out, woman seems to have taken divine rank before men; all the\nfirst inventions of the more useful arts and crafts, except in metals,\nare ascribed to goddesses; the Muses presided over poetry and music long\nbefore Apollo; Isis was \"the lady of bread,\" and Demeter taught men to\nsow barley and corn instead of eating each other. Thus even among our own\nforefathers we may catch a glimpse of a state of things which, as various\nanthropologists have shown (notably Otis Mason in his _Woman's Share in\nPrimitive Culture_), we may witness in the most widely separated parts of\nthe world. Thus among the Xosa Kaffirs, as well as other A-bantu stocks,\nFritsch states that \"the man claims for himself war, hunting, occupation\nwith cattle; all household cares, even the building of the house, as well\nas the cultivation of the ground, are woman's affair; hardly in the most\nlaborious work will a man lend a hand.\"[2] So that when to-day we see\nwomen entering the most various avocations, that is not a dangerous\ninnovation, but perhaps merely a return to ancient and natural\nconditions.\n\nIt is not until specialisation becomes necessary and until men are\nrelieved from the constant burden of battle and the chase that the\nfrequent superiority of woman is lost. The modern industrial activities\nare dangerous, when they are dangerous, not because the work is too\nhard--for the work of primitive women is harder--but because it is an\nunnaturally and artificially dreary and monotonous work which stifles the\nmind, depresses the spirits, and injures the body, so that, it is said,\n40 per cent. of married women who have been factory girls are treated for\npelvic disorders before they are thirty. It is the conditions of women's\nwork which need changing in order that they may become, like those of\nprimitive women, so various that they develop the mind and fortify the\nbody. This, however, is an evil which will be righted by the development\nof the mechanical side of industry, for machines tend constantly to\nbecome larger, heavier, speedier, more numerous and more automatic,\nrequiring fewer workers to tend them, and these more frequently men.[3]\n\nIt may be added that the early predominance of woman in the work of\ncivilisation is altogether independent of that conception of a primitive\nmatriarchate, or government of women, which was set forth some fifty\nyears ago by Bachofen, and has since caused so much controversy. Descent\nin the female line, not uncommonly found among primitive peoples,\nundoubtedly tended to place women in a position of great influence; but\nit by no means necessarily involved any gynecocracy, or rule of women,\nand such rule is merely a hypothesis which by some enthusiasts has been\ncarried to absurd lengths.\n\nWe see, therefore, that when we are approaching the question of the\nmental differences of the sexes among ourselves to-day, it is not\nimpossible to find certain guiding clues which will save us from running\ninto extravagance in either direction.\n\nWithout doubt the only way in which we can obtain a satisfactory answer\nto the numerous problems which meet us when we approach the question is\nby experiment. I have, indeed, insisted on the importance of these\npreliminary biological and historical considerations mainly because they\nindicate with what safety and freedom from risk we may trust to\nexperiment. The sexes are far too securely poised by organic constitution\nand ancient tradition for any permanently injurious results to occur from\nthe attempt to attain a better social readjustment in this matter. When\nthe experiment fails, individuals may to some extent suffer, but social\nequilibrium swiftly and automatically rights itself. Practically,\nhowever, nearly every social experiment of this kind means that certain\nrestrictions limiting the duties or privileges of women are removed, and\nwhen artificial coercions are thus taken away it can merely happen, as\nMary Wollstonecraft long ago put it, that by the common law of gravity\nthe sexes fall into their proper places. That, we may be sure, will be\nthe final result of the interesting experiments for which the laboratory\nto-day is furnished by all the belligerent countries.\n\nDefinitely formulated statistical data of these results are scarcely yet\navailable. But we may study the action of this natural process on one\ngreat practical experiment in mental sexual differences which has been\ngoing on for some time past. At one time in the various administrations\nof the International Postal Union there was a sudden resolve to introduce\nfemale labour to a very large extent; it was thought that this would be\ncheaper than male labour and equally efficient. There was consequently a\ngreat outcry at the ousting of male labour, the introduction of the thin\nend of a wedge which would break up society. We can now see that that\noutcry was foolish. Within recent years nearly all the countries which\npreviously introduced women freely into their postal and telegraph\nservices are now doing so only under certain conditions, and some are\nceasing to admit them at all. This great practical experiment, carried\nout on an immense scale in thirty-five different countries, has, on the\nwhole, shown that while women are not inferior to men, at all events\nwithin the ordinary range of work, the substitution of a female for a\nmale staff always means a considerable increase of numbers, that women\nare less rapid than men, less able to undertake the higher grade work,\nless able to exert authority over others, more lacking both in initiative\nand in endurance, while they require more sick leave and lose interest\nand energy on marriage. The advantages of female labour are thus to some\nextent neutralised, and in the opinions of the administrations of some\ncountries more than neutralised, by certain disadvantages. The general\nresult is that men are found more fitted for some branches of work and\nwomen more fitted for other branches; the result is compensation without\nany tendency for one sex to oust the other.\n\nIt may, indeed, be objected that in practical life no perfectly\nsatisfactory experiments exist as to the respective mental qualities of\nmen and women, since men and women are never found working under\nconditions that are exactly the same for both sexes. If, however, we turn\nto the psychological laboratory, where it is possible to carry on\nexperiments under precisely identical conditions, the results are still\nthe same. There are nearly always differences between men and women, but\nthese differences are complex and manifold; they do not always agree;\nthey never show any general piling up of the advantages on the side of\none sex or of the other. In reaction-time, in delicacy of sensory\nperception, in accuracy of estimation and precision of movement, there\nare nearly always sexual differences, a few that are fairly constant,\nmany that differ at different ages, in various countries, or even in\ndifferent groups of individuals. We cannot usually explain these\ndifferences or attach any precise significance to them, any more than we\ncan say why it is that (at all events in America) blue is most often the\nfavourite colour of men and red of women. We may be sure that these\nthings have a meaning, and often a really fundamental significance, but\nat present, for the most part, they remain mysterious to us.\n\nWhen we attempt to survey and sum up all the variegated facts which\nscience and practical life are slowly accumulating with reference to the\nmental differences between men and women[4] we reach two main\nconclusions. On the one hand there is a fundamental equality of the\nsexes. It would certainly appear that women vary within a narrower range\nthan men--that is to say, that the two extremes of genius and of idiocy\nare both more likely to show themselves in men. This implies that the\npioneers in progress are most likely to be men. That, indeed, may be said\nto be a biological fact. \"In all that concerns the evolution of\nornamental characters the male leads; in him we see the trend which\nevolution is taking; the female and young afford us the measure of their\nadvance along the new line which has to be taken.\"[5] In the human sphere\nof the arts and sciences, similarly, men, not women, take the lead. That\nmen were the first decorative artists, rather than women, is indicated by\nthe fact that the natural objects designed by early pre-historic artists\nwere mainly women and wild beasts, that is to say, they were the work of\nmasculine hunters, executed in idle intervals of the chase. But within\nthe range in which nearly all of us move, there are always many men who\nin mental respects can do what most women can do, many women who can do\nwhat most men can do. We are not justified in excluding a whole sex\nabsolutely from any field. In so doing we should certainly be depriving\nthe world of some portion of its executive ability. The sexes may always\nsafely be left to find their own levels.\n\nOn the other hand, the mental diversity of men and women is equally\nfundamental. It is rooted in organisation. The well-intentioned efforts\nof many pioneers in women's movements to treat men and women as\nidentical, and, as it were, to force women into masculine moulds, were\nboth mischievous and useless. Women will always be different from men,\nmentally as well as physically. It is well for both sexes that it should\nbe so. It is owing to these differences that each sex can bring to the\nworld's work various aptitudes that the other lacks. It is owing to these\ndifferences also that men and women have their undying charm for each\nother. We cannot change them, and we need not wish to.\n\n\n[1] See, for instance, Blair Bell's _The Sex Complex_, 1916, though\nthe deductions drawn in this book must not always be accepted without\nqualifications.\n\n[2] G. Fritsch, _Die Eingeborene Sued-Afrikas_, 1892, p. 79.\n\n[3] 1 D.R. Malcolm Keir, \"Women in Industry,\" _Popular Science Monthly_,\nOctober, 1913.\n\n[4] See, for many of the chief of these, Havelock Ellis, _Man and Woman_,\n5th Edition, 1914.\n\n[5] W.P. Pycraft, _The Courtship of Animal_, p. 9.\n\n\n\n\nX\n\n\nTHE WHITE SLAVE CRUSADE\n\nDuring recent years we have witnessed a remarkable attempt--more popular\nand more international in character than any before--to deal with that\nancient sexual evil which has for some time been picturesquely described\nas the White Slave Traffic. Less than forty years ago Professor Sheldon\nAmos wrote that this subject can scarcely be touched upon by journalists,\nand \"can never form a topic of common conversation.\" Nowadays Churches,\nsocieties, journalists, legislators have all joined the ranks of the\nagitators. Not only has there been no voice on the opposite side, which\nwas scarcely to be expected--for there has never been any anxiety to cry\naloud the defence of \"White Slavery\" from the house-tops--but there has\nbeen a new and noteworthy conquest over indifference and over that sacred\nsilence which was supposed to encompass all sexual topics with suitable\ndarkness. The banishment of that silence in the cause of social hygiene\nis, indeed, not the least significant feature of this agitation.\n\nIt is inevitable, however, that these periodical fits of virtuous\nindignation by which Society is overtaken should speedily be spent. The\nvictim of the moral fever finds himself exhausted by the struggle,\nscarcely able to cope with the complications of the disease, and, at the\nbest, only too anxious to forget what he has passed through. He has an\nuneasy feeling that in the course of his delirium he has said and done\nmany foolish things which it would now be unpleasant to recall too\nprecisely.\n\nThere is no use in attempting to disguise the fact that this is what\nhappened in the White Slave Traffic agitation. It became clear that we\nhad been largely misled in regard to the evils to be combated, and that\nwe were seduced into sanctioning various remedies for these evils which\nin cold blood it is impossible to approve of, even if we could believe\nthem to be effective.\n\nIt is not even clear that all those who have talked about the \"White\nSlave Traffic\" have been quite sure what they meant by the term. Some\npeople, indeed, have seemed to think that it meant prostitution in\ngeneral. That is, of course, an absurd misapprehension. We are\nconcerned with a trade which flourishes on prostitution, but that\ntrade is not itself the trade or (as some prefer to call it) the\nprofession of prostitutes. Indeed, the prostitute, under ordinary\nconditions and unharassed by persecution, is in many respects anything\nbut a slave. She is much less a slave than the ordinary married woman.\nShe is not fettered in humble dependence on the will of a husband from\nwhom it is the most difficult thing in the world to escape; she is\nbound to no man and free to make her own terms in life; while if she\nshould have a child, that child is absolutely her own, and she is not\nliable to have it torn from her arms by the hands of the law. Apart\nfrom arbitrary and accidental circumstances, due to the condition of\nsocial feeling, the prostitute enjoys a position of independence which\nthe married woman is still struggling to obtain.\n\nThe White Slave Traffic, therefore, is not prostitution; it is the\n_commercialised exploitation of prostitutes_. The independent\nprostitute, living alone, scarcely lends herself to the White Slave\ntrader. It is on houses of prostitution, where the less independent and\nusually weaker-minded prostitutes are segregated, that the traffic is\nbased. Such houses cannot even exist without such traffic. There is\nlittle inducement for a girl to enter such a house, in full knowledge\nof what it involves, on her own initiative. The proprietors of such\nhouses must therefore give orders for the \"goods\" they desire, and it\nis the business of procurers, by persuasion, misrepresentation, deceit,\nintoxication, to supply them. \"The White Slave Traffic,\" as Kneeland\nstates, \"is thus not only a hideous reality, but a reality almost\nwholly dependent on the existence of houses of prostitution,\" and as\nthe authors of _The Social Evil_ state, it is \"the most shameful\nspecies of business enterprise in modern times.\"[1]\n\nIn this intimate dependence of the White Slave Traffic on houses of\nprostitution, there lies, it may be pointed out, a hope for the future.\nWe are concerned, for the most part, with the more coarse-grained part\nof the masculine population and with the more ignorant, degraded, and\nweak-minded part of the army of prostitutes. Although much has been said\nof the enormous extension of the White Slave Traffic during recent\nyears, it is important to remember that that extension is chiefly marked\nin connection with the great new centres of population in the younger\ncountries. It is fostered by the conditions prevailing in crude,\nyouthful, prosperous, but incompletely blended, communities, which have\ntoo swiftly attained luxury, but have not yet attained the more humane\nand refined developments of civilisation, and among whom women are often\nscarce.[2] Although there are not yet any very clear signs of the decay\nof prostitution in civilisation, there can hardly be a doubt that\ncivilisation is unfavourable to houses of prostitution. They offer no\ninducements to the more intelligent and independent prostitutes, and\ntheir inmates usually present little attraction to any men save those\nwhose demands are of the humblest character. There is, therefore, a\ntendency to the natural and spontaneous decay of organised houses of\nprostitution under modern civilised conditions; the prostitute and her\nclients alike shun such houses. Along this line we may foresee the\ndisappearance of the White Slave Traffic, apart altogether from any\nsocial or legal attempts at its direct suppression.[3]\n\nIt is sometimes said that the relation of the isolated prostitute to her\n_souteneur_ constitutes a form of \"white slavery.\" Undoubtedly that may\nsometimes be the case. We are here in a confused field where the facts\nare complicated by a number of considerations, and where circumstances\nmay very widely differ, for the \"fancy boy\"--selected from affection by\nthe prostitute herself--may easily become the _souteneur_, or \"cadet\" as\nhe is termed in New York, who seduces and trains to prostitution a large\nnumber of girls. The prostitute is so often a little weak in character\nand a little defective in intelligence; she is so often regarded as a\nlegitimate prey by the world in which she moves, and a legitimate object\nof contempt and oppression by the social world above her and its legal\nofficers, that she easily becomes abjectly dependent on the man who in\nsome degree protects her from this extortion, contempt, and oppression,\neven though he sometimes trains her to his own ends and exploits her\nprofessional activities for his own advantage. These circumstances so\noften occur that some investigators consider that they represent the\ngeneral rule. No doubt they are the most conspicuous cases. But they can\nscarcely be regarded as representing the normal relations of the\nprostitute to the man she is attracted to. She is earning her own\nliving, and if she possesses a little modicum of character and\nintelligence, she knows that she can choose her own lover and dismiss\nhim when she so pleases. He may beat her occasionally, but all over the\nworld this is not always displeasing to the primitively feminine woman.\n\"It is indeed true,\" as Kneeland remarks, \"that many prostitutes do not\nbelieve their lovers care for them unless they 'beat them up'\noccasionally.\" The woman in this position is not more of a \"white slave\"\nthan many wives, and some husbands, who submit to the whims and\ntyrannies of their conjugal partners, with, indeed, the additional\nhardship and misfortune that they are legally bound to them. And the\n_souteneur_, although from the respectable point of view he has put\nhimself into a low-down moral position, is, after all, not so very\nunlike those parasitic wives who, on a higher social level, live lazily\non their husbands' professional earnings, and sometimes give much less\nthan the _souteneur_ in return.\n\nWhen, however, we put aside the complicated question of the prostitute's\nrelationship to the man who is her lover, protector, and \"bully,\" we\nhave to recognise that there really is a \"White Slave Traffic,\" carried\non in a ruthlessly business-like manner and on an international scale,\nwith watchful agents, men and women, ever ready to detect and lure the\nvictims. But even this too amply demonstrated fact was not found\nsufficiently highly spiced by the White Slave Traffic agitators. It was\nnecessary to excite the public mind by sensational incidents. Everyone\nwas told stories, as of incidents that had lately occurred in the next\nstreet, of innocent, refined, and well-bred girls who were snatched away\nby infamous brigands beneath the eyes of their friends, to be immured in\ndungeons of vice and never more heard of. Such incidents, if they ever\noccurred, would be too bizarre to be justifiably taken into account in\ngreat social movements. But it is even doubtful whether they ever occur.\nThe White Slave traders are not heroes of romance, even of infamous\nromance; less so, indeed, than many more ordinary criminals; they are\nengaged in a very definite and very profitable business. They have no\nneed to run serious risks. The world is full of girls who are\nover-worked, ill-paid, ignorant, weak, vain, greedy, lazy, or even only\nafflicted with a little innocent love of adventure, and it is among\nthese that White Slave traders may easily find what their business\ndemands, while experience enables them to detect the most likely\nsubjects.\n\nCareful inquiry, even among those who have made it their special\nbusiness to collect all the evidence that can be brought together to\nprove the infamous character of the White Slave Traffic, has apparently\nfailed to furnish any reliable evidence of these sensational stories. It\nis easy to find prostitutes who are often dissatisfied with the life (in\nwhat occupation is it not easy?), but it is not easy to find prostitutes\nwho cannot escape from that life when they sufficiently wish to do so,\nand are willing to face the difficulty of finding some other occupation.\nThe very fact that the whole object of their exploitation is to bring\nthem in contact with men belonging to the outside world is itself a\nguarantee that they are kept in touch with that world. Mrs.\nBillington-Grieg, a well-known pioneer in social movements, has\ncarefully investigated the alleged cases of forcible abduction which\nwere so freely talked about when the White Slave Bill was passed into\nlaw in England, but even the Vigilance Societies actively engaged in\nadvocating the bill could not enable her to discover a single case in\nwhich a girl had been entrapped against her will.[4] No other result\ncould reasonably have been expected. When so many girls are willing, and\neven eager, to be persuaded, there is little need for the risky\nadventure of capturing the unwilling. The uneasy realisation of these\nfacts cannot fail to leave many honest Vice-Crusaders with unpleasant\nmemories of their past.\n\nIt is not only in regard to alleged facts, but also in regard to\nproposed remedies, that the White Slave Agitation may properly be\ncriticised. In England it distinguished itself by the ferocity with\nwhich the lash was advocated, and finally legalised. Benevolent bishops\njoined with genteel old maids in calling loudly for whips, and even in\ndesiring to lay them personally on the backs of the offenders,\nnotwithstanding that these Crusaders were nominally Christians, the\nfollowers of a Master who conspicuously reserved His indignation, not\nfor sinners and law-breakers, but for self-satisfied saints and\nscrupulous law-keepers--just the same kind of excellent people, in\nfact, who are most prone to become Vice-Crusaders. Here again, it is\nprobable, many unpleasant memories have been stored up.\n\nIt is well recognised by criminologists that the lash is both a\nbarbarous and an ineffective method of punishment. \"The history of\nflagellation,\" as Collas states in his great work on this subject, \"is\nthe history of a moral bankruptcy.\"[5] The survival of barbarous\npunishments from barbarous days, when ferocious punishments were a\nmatter of course and the death penalty was inflicted for horse-stealing\nwithout in the least diminishing that offence, may be intelligible. But\nthe re-enactment of such measures in so-called civilised days is an\neverlasting discredit to those who advocate it, and a disgrace to the\ncommunity which permits it. This was pointed out at the time by a large\nbody of social reformers, and will no doubt be realised at leisure by\nthe persons concerned in the agitation.\n\nApart altogether from its barbarity, the lash is peculiarly unsuited\nfor use in the White Slave trade, because it will never descend on the\nback of the real trader. The whip has no terrors for those engaged in\nillegitimate financial transactions, for in such transactions the\nprincipal can always afford to arrange that it shall fall on a\nsubordinate who finds it worth while to run the risks. This method has\nlong been practised by those who exploit prostitution for profit. To\nincrease the risks merely means that the subordinate must be more\nheavily paid. That means that the whole business must be carried on\nmore actively to cover the increased risks and expenses. It is a very\nancient fact that moral legislation increases the evil it is designed\nto combat.[6]\n\nIt is necessary to point out some of the unhappy features of this\nagitation, not in order to minimise the evils it was directed against,\nnor to insinuate that they cannot be lessened, but as a warning against\nthe reaction which follows such ill-considered efforts. The fiery\nzealot in a fury of blind rage strikes wildly at the evil he has just\ndiscovered, and then flings down his weapon, glad to forget all about\nhis momentary rage and the errors it led him into. It is not so that\nancient evils are destroyed, evils, it must be remembered, that derive\ntheir vitality in part from human nature and in part from the structure\nof our society. By ensuring that our workers, and especially our women\nworkers, are decently paid, so that they can live comfortably on their\nwages, we shall not indeed have abolished prostitution, which is more\nthan an economic phenomenon,[7] but we shall more effectually check the\nWhite Slave trader than by the most draconic legislation the most\nimaginative Vice-Crusader ever devised. And when we ensure that these\nsame workers have ample time and opportunity for free and joyous\nrecreation, we shall have done more to kill the fascination of the\nWhite Slave Traffic than by endless police regulations for the moral\nsupervision of the young.\n\nNo doubt the element of human nature in the manifestations we are\nconcerned with will still be at work, an obscure instinct often acting\ndifferently in each sex, but tending to drive both into the same risks.\nHere we need even more fundamental social changes. It is sheer\nfoolishness to suppose that when we raise our little dams in the path of\na great stream of human impulse that stream will forthwith flow calmly\nback to its source. We must make our new channels concurrently with our\ndams. If we wish to influence prostitution we must re-make our marriage\nlaws and modify our whole conception of the sexual relationships. In the\nmeanwhile, we can at least begin to-day a task of education which must\nslowly though surely undermine the White Slave trader's stronghold. Such\nan education needs to be not merely instruction in the facts of sex and\nwise guidance concerning all the dangers and risks of the sexual life;\nit must also involve a training of the will, a development of the sense\nof responsibility, such as can never be secured by shutting our young\npeople up in a hot-house, sheltered from every fortifying breath of the\noutside world. Certainly there are many among us--and precisely the most\nhopeless persons from our present point of view--who can never grow into\nreally responsible persons.[8] Neither should they ever have been born.\nIt is our business to see that they are not born; and that, if they are,\nthey are at least placed under due social guardianship, so that we may\nnot be tempted to make laws for society in general which are only needed\nby this feeble and infirm folk. Thus it is that when we seek to deal\nwith the White Slave Trader and his victims and his patrons we have to\nrealise that they are all very much, as we have made them, moulded by\ntheir parents before birth, nourished on their mothers' knees. The task\nof making them over again next time, and making them better, is a\nrevolutionary task, but it begins at home, and there is no home in which\nsome part of the task cannot be carried out.\n\nIt is possible that at some period in the world's history, not only will\nthe White Slave Traffic disappear, but even prostitution itself, and it\nis for us to work towards that day. But we may be quite sure that the\nsocial state which sees the last of the \"social evil\" will be a social\nstate very unlike ours.\n\n\n[1] The nature of prostitution and of the White Slave Traffic and their\nrelation to each other may clearly be studied in such valuable\nfirst-hand investigations of the subject as _The Social Evil: With\nSpecial Reference to Conditions Existing in the City of New York_, 2nd\nedition, edited by E.R.A. Seligman, Putnam's, 1912; _Commercialised\nProstitution in New York City_, by G.J. Kneeland, New York Century Co.,\n1913; _Prostitution in Europe_, by Abraham Flexner, New York Century\nCo., 1914; _The Social Evil in Chicago_, by the Vice-Commission of\nChicago, 1911. As regards prostitution in England and its causes I\nshould like to call attention to an admirable little book, _Downward\nPaths_, published by Bell & Sons, 1916. The literature of the subject\nis, however, extensive, and a useful bibliography will be found in the\nfirst-named volume.\n\n[2] This is especially true of many regions in America, both North and\nSouth, where a hideous mixture of disparate nationalities furnishes\nconditions peculiarly favourable to the \"White Slave Traffic,\" when\nprosperity increases. See, for instance, the well-informed and temperately\nwritten book by Miss Jane Addams, _A New Conscience and\nan Ancient Evil_, 1912.\n\n[3] See Havelock Ellis: _Sex in Relation to Society (Studies in the\nPsychology of Sex)_, Vol. VI., Ch. VII.\n\n[4] \"The White Slave Traffic,\" _English Review_, June, 1913. It is just\njust the same in America. Mr. Brand-Whitlock, when Mayor of Toledo,\nthoroughly investigated a sensational story of this kind brought to him\nin great detail by a social worker and found that it possessed not the\nslightest basis of truth. \"It was,\" he remarks in an able paper on \"The\nWhite Slave\" (_Forum_, Feb., 1914), \"simply another variant of the story\nthat had gone the rounds of the continents, a story which had been\nsomehow psychologically timed to meet the hysteria which the pulpit,\nthe Press, and the legislature had displayed.\"\n\n[5] G.F. Collas, _Geschichte des Flagellantismus_, 1913, Vol. I., p. 16.\n\n[6] I have brought together some of the evidence on this point in the\nchapter on \"Immorality and the Law\" in my book, _The Task of Social\nHygiene_.\n\n[7] The idea is cherished by many, especially among socialists, that\nprostitution is mainly an economic question, and that to raise wages is\nto dry up the stream of prostitution. That is certainly a fallacy,\nunsupported by careful investigators, though all are agreed that the\neconomic condition of the wage-earner is one factor in the problem. Thus\nCommissioner Adelaide Cox, at the head of the Women's Social Wing of the\nSalvation Army, speaking from a very long and extensive acquaintance\nwith prostitutes, while not denying that women are often \"wickedly\nunderpaid,\" finds that the cause of prostitution is \"essentially a\nmoral one, and cannot be successfully fought by other than moral\nweapons.\"--(_Westminster Gazette_, Dec. 2nd, 1912). In a yet wider\nsense, it may be said that the question of the causes of prostitution\nis essentially social.\n\n[8] This is a very important clue indeed in dealing with the problem of\nprostitution. \"It is the weak-minded, unintelligent girl,\" Goddard\nstates in his valuable work on _Feeblemindedness_, \"who makes the White\nSlave Traffic possible.\" Dr. Hickson found that over 85 per cent. of\nthe women brought before the Morals Court in Chicago were distinctly\nfeeble-minded, and Dr. Olga Bridgeman states that among the girls\ncommitted for sexual delinquency to the Training School of Geneva,\nIllinois, 97 per cent. were feeble-minded by the Binet tests, and to be\nregarded as \"helpless victims.\" (Walter Clarke, _Social Hygiene_, June,\n1915, and _Journal of Mental Science_, Jan., 1916, p. 222.) There are\nfallacies in these figures, but it would appear that about half of the\nprostitutes in institutions are to be regarded as mentally defective.\n\n\n\n\nXI\n\n\nTHE CONQUEST OF VENEREAL DISEASE\n\nThe final Report of the Royal Commission on Venereal Diseases has brought\nto an end an important and laborious investigation at what many may\nregard as an unfavourable moment. Perhaps, however, the moment is not so\nunfavourable as it seems. There is no period when venereal diseases\nflourish so exuberantly as in war time, and we shall have a sad harvest\nto gather here when the War is over.[1] Moreover, the War is teaching us\nto face the real facts of life more frankly and more courageously than\never before, and there is no field, scarcely even a battlefield, where a\ntraining in frankness and courage is so necessary as in this of Venereal\nDisease. It is difficult even to say that there is any larger field, for\nit has been found possible to doubt whether the great War of to-day, when\nall is summed up, will have produced more death, disease, and misery than\nis produced in the ordinary course of events, during a single generation,\nby venereal disease.\n\nThere are, as every man and woman ought to know, two main and quite\ndistinct diseases (any other being unimportant) poetically termed\n\"Venereal\" because chiefly, though not by any means only, propagated in\nthe intercourse over which the Roman goddess Venus once presided. These\ntwo diseases are syphilis and gonorrhoea. Both these diseases are very\nserious, often terrible, in their effects on the individual attacked,\nand both liable to be poisonous to the race. There has long been a\npopular notion that, while syphilis is indeed an awful disease,\ngonorrhoea may be accepted with a light heart. That, we now know, is a\ngrave mistake. Gonorrhoea may seem trivial at the outset, but its\nresults, especially for a woman and her children (when it allows her to\nhave any), are anything but trivial; while its greater frequency, and\nthe indifference with which it is regarded, still further increase its\ndangers.\n\nAbout the serious nature of syphilis there is no doubt. It is a\ncomparatively modern disease, not clearly known in Europe before the\ndiscovery of America at the end of the fifteenth century, and by some\nauthorities[2] to-day supposed to have been imported from America. But\nit soon ravaged the whole of our world, and has continued to do so ever\nsince. During recent years it has perhaps shown a slight tendency to\ndecrease, though nothing to what could be achieved by systematic\nmethods; but its evils are still sufficiently alarming. Exactly how\ncommon it is cannot be ascertained with certainty. At least 10 per\ncent., probably more, of the population in our large cities have been\ninfected by syphilis, some before birth. In 1912 for an average strength\nof 120,000 men in the English Navy, nearly 300,000 days were lost as a\nresult of venereal disease, while among 100,000 soldiers in the Home\nArmy for the same year, an average of nearly 600 men were constantly\nsick from the same cause. We may estimate from this small example how\nvast must be the total loss of working power due to venereal disease.\nMoreover, in Sir William Osler's words, \"of the killing diseases\nsyphilis comes third or fourth.\" Its prevalence varies in different\nregions and different social classes. The mortality rate from syphilis\nfor males above fifteen is highest for unskilled labour, then for the\ngroup intermediate between unskilled and skilled labour, then for the\nupper and middle class, followed by the group intermediate between this\nclass and skilled labour, while skilled labour, textile workers, and\nminers follow, and agricultural labourers come out most favourably of\nall. These differences do not represent any ascending grade in virtue or\nsexual abstinence, but are dependent upon differences in social\ncondition; thus syphilis is comparatively rare among agricultural\nlabourers because they associate only with women they know and are not\nexposed to the temptation of strange women, while it is high among the\nupper class because they are shut out from sexual intimacy with women of\ntheir own class and so resort to prostitutes. On the whole, however, it\nwill be seen, the poison of syphilis is fairly diffused among all\nclasses. This poison may work through many years or even the whole of\nlife, and its early manifestations are the least important. It may begin\nbefore birth: thus, one recent investigation shows that in 150\nsyphilitic families there were only 390 seemingly healthy children to\n401 infant deaths, stillbirths, and miscarriages (as against 172 in 180\nhealthy families), the great majority of these failures being infant\ndeaths and thus representing a large amount of wasted energy and\nexpense.[3] Syphilis is, again, the most serious single cause of the\nmost severe forms of brain disease and insanity, this often coming on\nmany years after the infection, and when the early symptoms were but\nslight. Blindness and deafness from the beginning of life are in a large\nproportion of cases due to syphilis. There is, indeed, no organ of the\nbody which is not liable to break down, often with fatal results,\nthrough syphilis, so that it has been well said that a doctor who knows\nsyphilis thoroughly is familiar with every branch of his profession.\n\nGonorrhoea is a still commoner disease than syphilis; how common it is\nvery difficult to say. It is also an older disease, for the ancient\nEgyptians knew it, and the Biblical King Esarhaddon of Assyria, as the\nrecords of his court show, once caught it. It seems to some people no\nmore serious than a common cold, yet it is able to inflict much\nprolonged misery on its victims, while on the race its influence in the\nlong run is even more deadly than that of syphilis, for gonorrhoea is\nthe chief cause of sterility in women, that is to say, in from 30 to 50\nper cent. of such cases, while of cases of sterility in men (which form\na quarter to a third of the whole) gonorrhoea is the cause in from 70 to\n90 per cent. The inflammation of the eyes of the new-born leading to\nblindness is also in 70 per cent. cases due to gonorrhoea in the mother,\nand this occurs in over six per 1,000 births.\n\nThree years ago a Royal Commission was appointed to investigate the best\nmethods of controlling venereal disease, as small-pox, typhus, and to a\nlarge extent typhoid, have already been controlled. The Commission was\nwell composed, not merely of officials and doctors, but of experienced\nmen and women in various fields, and the final Report is signed by all\nthe members, any difference of opinion being confined to minor points\n(which it is unnecessary to touch on here) and to two members only. The\nrecommendations are conceived in the most practical and broad-minded\nspirit. They are neither faddy nor goody-goody. Some indeed may wish that\nthey had gone further. The Commission leave over for later consideration\nthe question of notifying venereal disease as other infectious diseases\nare notified, and there is no recommendation for the provision of\npreventive methods against infection for use before intercourse, such as\nare officially favoured in Germany. But at both these points the\nCommissioners have been wise, for they are points to which sections of\npublic opinion are still strongly hostile.[4] As they stand, the\nrecommendations should carry conviction to all serious and reasonable\npersons. Already, indeed, the Government, without opposition, has\nexpressed its willingness to undertake the financial burden which the\nCommission would impose on it.\n\nThe main Recommendations made by the Commission, if we put aside the\nsuggestions for obtaining a more exact statistical knowledge, may be\nplaced under the heads of Treatment and Prevention. As regards the\nfirst, it is insisted that measures should be taken to render the best\nmodern treatment, which should be free to all, readily available for\nthe whole community, in such a way that those affected will have no\nhesitation in taking advantage of the facilities thus offered. The\nmeans of treatment should be organised by County Councils and Boroughs,\nunder the Local Government Board, which should have power to make\nindependent arrangements when the local authorities fail in their\nduties. Institutional treatment should be provided at all general\nhospitals, special arrangements made for the treatment of out-patients\nin the evenings, and no objection offered to patients seeking treatment\noutside their own neighbourhoods. The expenditure should be assisted by\ngrants from Imperial Funds to the extent of 75 per cent. It may be\nadded that, however heavy such expenditure may be, an economy can\nscarcely fail to be effected. The financial cost of venereal disease\nto-day is so vast as to be beyond calculation. It enters into every\nfield of life. It is enough merely to consider the significant little\nfact that the cost of educating a deaf child is ten times as great as\nthat of educating an ordinary child.\n\nUnder the head of Prevention we may place such a suggestion as that the\nexistence of infective venereal disease should constitute legal\nincapacity for marriage, even when unknown, and be a sufficient cause\nfor annulling the marriage at the discretion of the court. But by far\nthe chief importance under this head is assigned by the Commission to\neducation and instruction. We see here the vindication of those who for\nyears have been teaching that the first essential in dealing with\nvenereal disease is popular enlightenment. There must be more careful\ninstruction--\"through all types and grades of education\"--on the sexual\nrelations in regard to conduct, while further instruction should be\nprovided in evening continuation schools, as well as factories and\nworks, with the aid of properly constituted voluntary associations.\n\nThese are sound and practical recommendations which, as the Government\nhas realised, can be put in action at once. A few years ago any attempt\nto control venereal disease was considered by many to be almost impious.\nSuch disease was held to be the just visitation of God upon sin and to\ninterfere would be wicked. We know better now. A large proportion of\nthose who are most severely struck by venereal disease are new-born\nchildren and trustful wives, while a simple kiss or the use of towels and\ncups in common has constantly served to spread venereal disease in a\nfamily. Even when we turn to the commonest method of infection, we have\nstill to remember that we are dealing largely with inexperienced youths,\nwith loving and trustful girls, who have yielded to the deepest and most\nvolcanic impulse of their natures, and have not yet learnt that that\nimpulse is a thing to be held sacred for their own sakes and the sake of\nthe race. In so far as there is sin, it is sin which must be shared by\nthose who have failed to train and enlighten the young. A Pharisaic\nattitude is not only highly mischievous in its results, but is here\naltogether out of place. Much harm has been done in the past by the\naction of Benefit Societies in withholding recognition and treatment from\nvenereal disease.\n\nIt is evident that this thought was at the back of the minds of those\nwho framed these wise recommendations. We cannot expect to do away all\nat once with the feeling that venereal disease is \"shameful.\" It may\nnot even be desirable. But we can at least make clear that, in so far\nas there is any shame, it must be a question between the individual and\nhis own conscience. From the point of view of science, syphilis and\ngonorrhoea are just diseases, like cancer and consumption, the only\ndiseases with which they can be compared in the magnitude and extent of\ntheir results, and therefore it is best to speak of them by their\nscientific names, instead of trying to invent vague and awkward\ncircumlocutions. From the point of view of society, any attitude of\nshame is unfortunate, because it is absolutely essential that these\ndiseases should be met in the open and grappled with methodically and\nthoroughly. Otherwise, as the Commission recognises, the sufferer is\napt to become the prey of ignorant quacks whose inefficient treatment\nis largely responsible for the development of the latest and worst\nafflictions these diseases produce when not effectually nipped in the\nbud. That they can be thus cut short--far more easily than consumption,\nto say nothing of cancer--is the fact which makes it possible to hope\nfor a conquest over venereal disease. It is a conquest that would make\nthe whole world more beautiful and deliver love from its ugliest\nshadow. But the victory cannot be won by science alone, not even in\nalliance with officialdom. It can only be won through the enlightened\nco-operation of the whole nation.\n\n\n[1] The increase of venereal disease during the Great War has been\nnoted alike in Germany, France, and England. Thus, as regards France,\nGaucher has stated at the Paris Academy of Medicine (_Journal de\nMedicine_, May 10th, 1916) that since mobilisation syphilis had\nincreased by nearly one half, alike among soldiers and civilians; it\nhad much increased in quite young people and in elderly men. In\nGermany, Neisser, a leading authority, states (_Deutsche Medizinische\nWochenschrift_, 14th Jan., 1915) that the prevalence of venereal\ndisease is much greater than in the war of 1870, and that \"every day\nmany thousands, not to say tens of thousands, of otherwise able-bodied\nmen are withdrawn from the service on this account.\"\n\n[2] The chief is Iwan Bloch who, in his elaborate work, _Der Ursprung\nder Syphilis_ (2 vols., 1901, 1911), has fully investigated the evidence.\n\n[3] N. Bishop Harman, \"The Influence of Syphilis on the Chances of\nProgeny,\" _British Medical Journal_, Feb. 5th, 1916.\n\n[4] It is true that in my book, _Sex in Relation to Society_ (Ch. VIII.)\nI have stated my belief that notification, as in the case of other\nserious infectious diseases, is the first step in the conquest of\nvenereal disease. I still think it ought to be so. But a yet more\npreliminary step is popular enlightenment as to the need for such\nnotification. The recommendations seem to me to go as far as it is\npossible to go at the moment in English-speaking countries without\nproducing friction and opposition. In so far as they are carried out\nthe recommendations will ensure the necessary popular enlightenment.\n\n\n\n\nXII\n\n\nTHE NATIONALISATION OF HEALTH\n\nIt was inevitable that we should some day have to face the problem of\nmedical reorganisation on a social basis. Along many lines social\nprogress has led to the initiation of movements for the improvement\nof public health. But they are still incomplete and imperfectly\nco-ordinated. We have never realised that the great questions of health\ncannot safely be left to municipal tinkering and the patronage of\nBumbledom. The result is chaos and a terrible waste, not only of what\nwe call \"hard cash,\" but also of sensitive flesh and blood. Health,\nthere cannot be the slightest doubt, is a vastly more fundamental and\nimportant matter than education, to say nothing of such minor matters\nas the post office or the telephone system. Yet we have nationalised\nthese before even giving a thought to the Nationalisation of Health.\n\nAt the present day medicine is mainly in the hands, as it was two\nthousand years ago, of the \"private practitioner.\" His mental status\nhas, indeed, changed. To-day he is submitted to a long and arduous\ntraining in magnificently equipped institutions; all the laboriously\nacquired processes and results of modern medicine and hygiene are\nbrought within the student's reach. And when he leaves the hospital,\noften with the largest and noblest conception of the physician's place\nin life, what do we do with him? He becomes a \"private practitioner,\"\nwhich means, as Duclaux, the late distinguished Director of the Pasteur\nInstitute, put it, that we place him on the level of a retail grocer\nwho must patiently stand behind his counter (without the privilege of\nadvertising himself) until the public are pleased to come and buy\nadvice or drugs which are usually applied for too late to be of much\nuse, and may be thrown away at the buyer's good pleasure, without the\npossibility of any protest by the seller. It is little wonder that in\nmany cases the doctor's work and aims suffer under such conditions; his\nnature is subdued to what it works in; he clings convulsively to his\ncounter and its retail methods.\n\nThe fact is--and it is a fact that is slowly becoming apparent to\nall--that the private practice of medicine is out of date. It fails to\nanswer the needs of our time. There are various reasons why this should\nbe the case, but two are fundamental. In the first place, medicine has\noutgrown the capacity of any individual doctor; the only adequate\nprivate practitioner must have a sound general knowledge of medicine\nwith an expert knowledge of a dozen specialties; that is to say, he must\ngive place to a staff of doctors acting co-ordinately, for the present\nsystem, or lack of system, by which a patient wanders at random from\nprivate practitioner to specialist, from specialist to specialist\n_ad infinitum_, is altogether mischievous. Moreover, not only is it\nimpossible for the private practitioner to possess the knowledge\nrequired to treat his patients adequately: he cannot possess the\nscientific mechanical equipment nowadays required alike for diagnosis\nand treatment, and every day becoming more elaborate, more expensive,\nmore difficult to manipulate. It is installed in our great hospitals\nfor the benefit of the poorest patient; it could, perhaps, be set up\nin a millionaire's palace, but it is hopelessly beyond the private\npractitioner, though without it his work must remain unsatisfactory and\ninadequate.[1] In the second place, the whole direction of modern\nmedicine is being changed and to an end away from private practice; our\nthoughts are not now mainly bent on the cure of disease but on its\nprevention. Medicine is becoming more and more transformed into hygiene,\nand in this transformation, though the tasks presented are larger and\nmore systematic, they are also easier and more economical. These two\nfundamental tendencies of modern medicine--greater complexity of its\nmethods and the predominantly preventive character of its aims--alone\nsuffice to render the position of the private practitioner untenable. He\ncannot cope with the complexity of modern medicine; he has no authority\nto enforce its hygiene.\n\nThe medical system of the future must be a national system co-ordinating\nall the conditions of health. At the centre we should expect to find a\nMinister of Health, and every doctor of the State would give his whole\ntime to his work and be paid by salary which in the case of the higher\nposts would be equal to that now fixed for the higher legal offices, for\nthe chief doctor in the State ought to be at least as important an\nofficial as the Lord Chancellor. Hospitals and infirmaries would be alike\nnationalised, and, in place of the present antagonism between hospitals\nand the bulk of the medical profession, every doctor would be in touch\nwith a hospital, thus having behind him a fully equipped and staffed\ninstitution for all purposes of diagnosis, consultation, treatment, and\nresearch, also serving for a centre of notification, registration,\npreventive and hygienic measures. In every district the citizen would\nhave a certain amount of choice as regards the medical man to whom he\nmay go for advice, but no one would be allowed to escape the medical\nsupervision and registration of his district, for it is essential that\nthe central Health Authority of every district should know the health\nconditions of all the inhabitants of the district. Only by some such\norganised and co-ordinated system as this can the primary conditions of\nHealth, and preventive measures against disease, be genuinely socialised.\n\nThese views were put forward by the present writer twenty years ago in\na little book on _The Nationalisation of Health_, which, though it met\nwith wide approval, was probably regarded by most people as Utopian.\nSince then the times have moved, a new generation has sprung up, and\nideas which, twenty years ago, were brooded over by isolated thinkers\nare now seen to be in the direct line of progress; they have become the\nproperty of parties and matters of active propaganda. Even before the\nintroduction of State Insurance Professor Benjamin Moore, in his able\nbook, _The Dawn of the Health Age_, anticipating the actual march of\nevents, formulated a State Insurance Scheme which would lead on, as he\npointed out, to a genuinely National Medical Service, and later, Dr.\nMacilwaine, in a little book entitled _Medical Revolution_, again\nadvocated the same changes: the establishment of a Ministry of Health,\na medical service on a preventive basis, and the reform of the\nhospitals which must constitute the nucleus of such a service. It may\nbe said that for medical men no longer engaged in private practice it\nis easy to view the disappearance of private practice with serenity;\nbut it must be added that it is precisely that disinterested serenity\nwhich makes possible also a clear insight into the problems and a wider\nview of the new horizons of medicine. Thus it is that to-day the\ndreamers of yesterday are justified.\n\nThe great scheme of State Insurance was certainly an important step\ntowards the socialisation of medicine. It came short, indeed, of the\ncomplete Nationalisation of Health as an affair of State. But that\ncould not possibly be introduced at one move. Apart even from the\ndifficulty of complete reorganisation, the two great vested interests\nof private medical practice on the one hand and Friendly Societies on\nthe other would stand in the way. A complicated transitional period is\nnecessary, during which those two interests are conciliated and\ngradually absorbed. It is this transitional period which State\nInsurance has inaugurated. To compare small things to great--as we may,\nfor the same laws run all through Nature and Society--this scheme\ncorresponds to the ancient Ptolomaean system of astronomy, with its\npainfully elaborate epicycles, which preceded and led on to the sublime\nsimplicity of the Copernican system. We need not anticipate that the\ntransitional stage of national insurance will endure as long as the\nancient astronomy. Professor Moore estimated that it would lead to a\ncompletely national medical service in twenty-five years, and since the\nintroduction of that method he has, too optimistically, reduced the\nperiod to ten years. We cannot reach simplicity at a bound; we must\nfirst attempt to systematise the recognised and established activities\nand adjust them harmoniously.\n\nThe organised refusal of the medical profession at the outset to carry\non, under the conditions offered, the part assigned to it in the great\nNational Insurance scheme opened out prospects not clearly realised by\nthe organisers. No doubt its immediate aspects were unfortunate. It not\nonly threatened to impede the working of a very complex machine, but it\ndismayed many who were not prepared to see doctors apparently taking up\nthe position of the syndicalists, and arguing that a profession which\nis essential to the national welfare need not be carried out on\nnational lines, but can be run exclusively by itself in its own\ninterests. Such an attitude, however, usefully served to make clear how\nnecessary it is becoming that the extension of medicine and hygiene in\nthe national life should be accompanied by a corresponding extension in\nthe national government. If we had had a Council of National Health, as\nwell as of National Defence, or a Board of Health as well as a Board of\nTrade, a Minister of Health with a seat in the Cabinet, any scheme of\nInsurance would have been framed from the outset in close consultation\nwith the profession which would have the duty of carrying it out. No\nsubsequent friction would have been possible.\n\nHad the Insurance scheme been so framed, it is perhaps doubtful whether\nit would have been so largely based on the old contract system. Club\nmedical practice has long been in discredit, alike from the point of\nview of patient and doctor. It furnishes the least satisfactory form of\nmedical relief for the patient, less adequate than that he could obtain\neither as a private patient or as a hospital patient. The doctor, on\nhis side, though he may find it a very welcome addition to his income,\nregards Club practice as semi-charitable, and, moreover, a form of\ncharity in which he is often imposed on; he seldom views his club\npatients with much satisfaction, and unless he is a self-sacrificing\nenthusiast, it is not to them that his best attention, his best time,\nhis most expensive drugs, are devoted. To perpetuate and enlarge the\nclub system of practice and to glorify it by affixing to it a national\nseal of approval, was, therefore, a somewhat risky experiment, not\nwisely to be attempted without careful consultation with those most\nconcerned.\n\nAnother point might then also have become clear: the whole tendency of\nmedicine is towards a recognition of the predominance of Hygiene. The\nmodern aim is to prevent disease. The whole national system of medicine\nis being slowly though steadily built up in recognition of the great\nfact that the interests of Health come before the interests of Disease.\nIt has been an unfortunate flaw in the magnificent scheme of Insurance\nthat this vital fact was not allowed for, that the old-fashioned notion\nthat treatment rather than prevention is the object of medicine was\nstill perpetuated, and that nothing was done to co-ordinate the\nInsurance scheme with the existing Health Services.\n\nIt seems probable that in a Service of State medical officers the\nsolution may ultimately be found. Such a solution would, indeed,\nimmensely increase the value of the Insurance scheme, and, in the end,\nconfer far greater benefits than at present on the millions of people who\nwould come under its operation. For there can be no doubt the Club system\nis not only unscientific; it is also undemocratic. It perpetuates what\nwas originally a semi-charitable and second-rate method of treatment of\nthe poorer classes. A State medical officer, devoting his whole time and\nattention to his State patients, has no occasion to make invidious\ndistinctions between public and private patients.\n\nA further advantage of a State Medical Service is that it will facilitate\nthe inevitable task of nationalising the hospitals, whether charitable or\nPoor-law. The Insurance Act, as it stands, opens no definite path in this\ndirection. But nowadays, so vast and complicated has medicine become,\neven the most skilful doctor cannot adequately treat his patient unless\nhe has a great hospital at his back, with a vast army of specialists and\nresearch-workers, and a manifold instrumental instalment.\n\nA third, and even more fundamental, advantage of a State Medical Service\nis that it would help to bring Treatment into touch with Prevention. The\nprivate practitioner, as such, inside or outside the Insurance scheme,\ncannot conveniently go behind his patient's illness. But the State doctor\nwould be entitled to ask: _Why_ has this man broken down? The State's\nguardianship of the health of its citizens now begins at birth (is\ntending to be carried back before birth) and covers the school life. If\na man falls ill, it is, nowadays, legitimate to inquire where the\nresponsibility lies. It is all very well to patch up the diseased man\nwith drugs or what not. But at best that is a makeshift method. The\nConsumptive Sanatoriums have aroused enthusiasm, and they also are all\nvery well. But the Charity Organisation Society has shown that only about\n50 per cent. of those who pass through such institutions become fit for\nwork. It is not more treatment of disease that we want, it is less need\nfor treatment. And a State Medical Service is the only method by which\nMedicine can be brought into close touch with Hygiene.\n\nThe present attitude of the medical profession sometimes strikes people\nas narrow, unpatriotic, and merely self-interested. But the Insurance\nAct has brought a powerful ferment of intellectual activity into the\nmedical profession which in the end will work to finer issues. A\nsignificant sign of the times is the establishment of the State Medical\nService Association, having for its aim the organisation of the medical\nprofession as a State Service, the nationalisation of hospitals, and\nthe unification of preventive and curative medicine. To many in the\nmedical profession such schemes still seem \"Utopian\"; they are blind to\na process which has been in ever increasing action for more than half a\ncentury and which they are themselves taking part in every day.\n\n\n[1] The result sometimes is that the ambitious doctor seeks to become\na specialist in at least one subject, and instals a single expensive\nmethod of treatment to which he enthusiastically subjects all his\npatients. This would be comic if it were not sometimes rather tragic.\n\n\n\n\nXIII\n\n\nEUGENICS AND GENIUS\n\nThe cry is often heard to-day from those who watch with disapproval the\nefforts made to discourage the reckless procreation of the degenerate\nand the unfit: You are stamping out the germs of genius! It is widely\nheld that genius is a kind of flower, unknown to the horticulturist,\nwhich only springs from diseased roots; make the plant healthily sound\nand your hope of blossoms is gone, you will see nothing but leaves. Or,\naccording to the happier metaphor of Lombroso, the work of genius is an\nexquisite pearl, and pearls are the product of an obscure disease. To\nthe medical mind, especially, it has sometimes been, naturally and\nproperly no doubt, a source of satisfaction to imagine that the\nloveliest creations of human intellect may perhaps be employed to shed\nradiance on the shelves of the pathological museum. Thus we find eminent\nphysicians warning us against any effort to decrease the vigour of\npathological processes, and influential medical journals making solemn\nstatements in the same sense. \"Already,\" I read in a recent able and\ninteresting editorial article in the _British Medical Journal_,\n\"eugenists in their kind enthusiasm are threatening to stamp out the\ngerms of possible genius.\"\n\nNow it is quite easy to maintain that the health, happiness, and sanity\nof the whole community are more precious even than genius. It is so\neasy, indeed, that if the question of eugenics were submitted to the\nReferendum on this sole ground there can be little doubt what the result\nwould be. There are not many people, even in the most highly educated\ncommunities, who value the possibility of a new poem, symphony, or\nmathematical law so highly that they would sacrifice their own health,\nhappiness, and sanity to retain that possibility for their offspring. Of\ncourse we may declare that a majority which made such a decision must be\ncomposed of very low-minded uncultured people, altogether lacking in\nappreciation of pathology, and reflecting no credit on the eugenic cause\nthey supported; but there can be little doubt that we should have to\nadmit their existence.\n\nWe need not hasten, however, to place the question on this ground. It\nis first necessary to ascertain what reason there is to suppose that a\nregard for eugenic considerations in mating would tend to stamp out the\ngerms of genius. Is there any reason at all? That is the question I am\nhere concerned with.\n\nThe anti-eugenic argument on this point, whenever any argument is\nbrought forward, consists in pointing to all sorts of men of genius and\nof talent who, it is alleged, were poor citizens, physical degenerates\nthe prey of all manner of constitutional diseases, sometimes candidates\nfor the lunatic asylum which they occasionally reached. The miscellaneous\ndata which may thus be piled up are seldom critically sifted, and often\nvery questionable, for it is difficult enough to obtain any positive\nbiological knowledge concerning great men who died yesterday, and\npractically impossible in most cases to reach an unquestionable\nconclusion as regards those who died a century or more ago. Many of the\nmost positive statements commonly made concerning the diseases even of\nmodern genius are without any sure basis. The case of Nietzsche, who was\nseen by some of the chief specialists of the day, is still really quite\nobscure. So is that of Guy de Maupassant. Rousseau wrote the fullest and\nfrankest account of his ailments, and the doctors made a _post-mortem_\nexamination. Yet nearly all the medical experts--and they are many--who\nhave investigated Rousseau's case reach different conclusions. It would\nbe easy to multiply indefinitely the instances of great men of the past\nconcerning whose condition of health or disease we are in hopeless\nperplexity.\n\nThis fact is, however, one that, as an argument, works both ways, and\nthe important point is to make clear that it cannot concern us. No\neugenic considerations can annihilate the man of genius when he is once\nborn and bred. If eugenics is to stamp out the man of genius it must do\nso before he is born, by acting on his parents.\n\nNor is it possible to assume that if the man of genius, apart from his\ngenius, is an unfit person to procreate the race, therefore his parents,\nnot possessing any genius, were likewise unfit to propagate. It is easy\nto find persons of high ability who in other respects are unfit for\nthe ends of life, ill-balanced in mental or physical development,\nneurasthenic, valetudinarian, the victims in varying degrees of all\nsorts of diseases. Yet their parents, without any high ability, were, to\nall appearance, robust, healthy, hard-working, commonplace people who\nwould easily pass any ordinary eugenic tests. We know nothing as to the\naction of two seemingly ordinary persons on each other in constituting\nheredity, how hypertrophied intellectual aptitude comes about, what\naccidents, normal or pathological, may occur to the germ before birth,\nnor even how strenuous intellectual activity may affect the organism\ngenerally. We cannot argue that since these persons, apart from their\ngenius, were not seemingly the best people to carry on the race,\ntherefore a like judgment should be passed on their parents and the\ngerms of genius thus be stamped out.\n\nWe only arrive at the crucial question when we ask: Have the characters\nof the parents of men of genius been of such an obviously unfavourable\nkind that eugenically they would nowadays be dissuaded from\npropagation, or under a severe _regime_ of compulsory certificates (the\ndesirability of which I am far indeed from assuming) be forbidden to\nmarry? Have the parents of genius belonged to the \"unfit\"? That is a\nquestion which must be answered in the affirmative if this objection to\neugenics has any weight. Yet so far as I know, none of those who have\nbrought forward the objection have supported it by any evidence of the\nkind whatever. Thirty years ago Dr. Maudsley dogmatically wrote: \"There\nis hardly ever a man of genius who has not insanity or nervous disorder\nof some form in his family.\" But he never brought forward any evidence\nin support of that pronouncement. Nor has anyone else, if we put aside\nthe efforts of more or less competent writers--like Lombroso in his\n_Man of Genius_ and Nisbet in his _Insanity of Genius_--to rake in\nstatements from all quarters regarding the morbidities of genius, often\nwithout any attempt to authenticate, criticise, or sift them, and never\nwith any effort to place them in due perspective.[1]\n\nIt so happens that, some years ago, with no relation to eugenic\nconsiderations, I devoted a considerable amount of attention to the\nbiological characters of British men of genius, considered, so far as\npossible, on an objective and impartial basis.[2] The selection, that\nis to say, was made, so far as possible, without regard to personal\npredilections, in accordance with certain rules, from the _Dictionary\nof National Biography_. In this way one thousand and thirty names were\nobtained of men and women who represent the flower of British genius\nduring historical times, only excluding those persons who were alive at\nthe end of the last century. What proportion of these were the\noffspring of parents who were insane or mentally defective to a serious\nextent?\n\nIf the view of Maudsley--that there is \"hardly ever\" a man of genius\nwho is not the product of an insane or nervously-disordered stock--had\na basis of truth, we should expect that in one or other parents of the\nman of genius actual insanity had occurred in a very large proportion\nof cases; 25 per cent. would be a moderate estimate. But what do we\nfind? In not 1 per cent. can definite insanity be traced among the\nparents of British men and women of genius. No doubt this result is\nbelow the truth; the insanity of the parents must sometimes have\nescaped the biographer's notice. But even if we double the percentage\nto escape this source of error, the proportion still remains\ninsignificant.\n\nThere is more to be said. If the insanity of the parent occurred early\nin life, we should expect it to attract attention more easily than if\nit occurred late in life. Those parents of men of genius falling into\ninsanity late in life, the critic may argue, escape notice. But it is\nprecisely to this group to which all the ascertainably insane parents\nof British men of genius belong. There is not a single recorded\ninstance, so far as I have been able to ascertain, in which the parent\nhad been definitely and recognisably insane before the birth of the\ndistinguished child; so that any prohibition of the marriage of persons\nwho had previously been insane would have left British genius\nuntouched. In all cases the insanity came on late in life, and it was\nusually, without doubt, of the kind known as senile dementia. This was\nso in the case of the mother of Bacon, the most distinguished person in\nthe list of those with an insane parent. Charles Lamb's father, we are\ntold, eventually became \"imbecile.\" Turner's mother became insane. The\nsame is recorded of Archbishop Tillotson's mother and of Archbishop\nLeighton's father. This brief list includes all the parents of British\nmen of genius who are recorded (and not then always very definitely) as\nhaving finally died insane. In the description given of others of the\nparents of our men of genius it is not, however, difficult to detect\nthat, though they were not recognised as insane, their mental condition\nwas so highly abnormal as to be not far removed from insanity. This was\nthe case with Gray's father and with the mothers of Arthur Young and\nAndrew Bell. Even when we allow for all the doubtful cases, the\nproportion of persons of genius with an insane parent remains very low,\nless than 2 per cent.\n\nSenile dementia, though it is one of the least important and\nsignificant of the forms of insanity, and is entirely compatible with a\nlong and useful life, must not, however, be regarded, when present in a\nmarked degree, as the mere result of old age. Entirely normal people of\nsound heredity do not tend to manifest signs of pronounced mental\nweakness or abnormality even in extreme old age. We are justified in\nsuspecting a neurotic strain, though it may not be of severe degree.\nThis is, indeed, illustrated by our records of British genius. Some of\nthe eminent men of genius on my list (at least twelve) suffered before\ndeath from insanity which may probably be described as senile dementia.\nBut several of these were somewhat abnormal during earlier life (like\nSwift) or had a child who became insane (like Bishop Marsh). In these\nand in other cases there has doubtless been some hereditary neurotic\nstrain.\n\nIt is clearly, however, not due to any intensity of this strain that we\nfind the incidence of insanity in men of genius, as illustrated, for\nexample, by senile dementia, so much more marked than its incidence on\ntheir parents. There is another factor to be invoked here: convergent\nmorbid heredity. If a man and a woman, each with a slight tendency to\nnervous abnormality, marry each other, there is a much greater chance\nof the offspring manifesting a severe degree of nervous abnormality\nthan if they had married entirely sound partners. Now both among normal\nand abnormal people there is a tendency for like to mate with like.\nThe attraction of the unlike for each other, which was once supposed\nto prevail, is not predominant, except within the sphere of the secondary\nsexual characters, where it clearly prevails, so that the ultra-masculine\nman is attracted to the ultra-feminine woman, and the feminine man to the\nboyish or mannish woman. Apart from this, people tend to marry those who\nare both psychically and physically of the same type as themselves. It\nthus happens that nervously abnormal people become mated to the nervously\nabnormal. This is well illustrated by the British men of genius\nthemselves. Although insanity is more prevalent among them than among\ntheir parents, the same can scarcely be said of them in regard to their\nwives. It is notable that the insane wives of these men of genius are\nalmost as numerous as the insane men of genius, though it rarely happens\n(as in the case of Southey) that both husband and wife go out of their\nminds. But in all these cases there has probably been a mutual attraction\nof mentally abnormal people.\n\nIt is to this tendency in the parents of men of genius, leading to a\nconvergent heredity, that we must probably attribute the undue tendency\nof the men of genius themselves to manifest insanity. Each of the\nparents separately may have displayed but a minor degree of neuropathic\nabnormality, but the two strains were fortified by union and the\ntendency to insanity became more manifest. This was, for instance, the\ncase as regards Charles Lamb. The nervous abnormality of the parents in\nthis case was less profound than that of the children, but it was\npresent in both. Under such circumstances what is called the law of\nanticipation comes into play; the neurotic tendency of the parents,\nincreased by union, is also antedated, so that definite insanity occurs\nearlier in the life of the child than, if it had appeared at all, it\noccurred in the life of the parent. Lamb's father only became\nweak-minded in old age, but since the mother also had a mentally\nabnormal strain, Lamb himself had an attack of insanity early in life,\nand his sister was liable to recurrent insanity during a great part of\nher life. Notwithstanding, however, the influence of this convergent\nheredity, it is found that the total insanity of British men and women\nof genius is not more, so far as can be ascertained--even when slight\nand dubious cases are included--than 4.2 per cent. That ascertainable\nproportion must be somewhat below the real proportion, but in any case\nit scarcely suggests that insanity is an essential factor of genius.\n\nLet us, however, go beyond the limits of British genius, and consider\nthe evidence more freely. There is, for instance, Tasso, who was\nundoubtedly insane for a good part of his life, and has been much\nstudied by the pathologists. De-Gaudenzi, who has written one of the\nbest psychopathological studies of Tasso, shows clearly that his\nfather, Bernardo, was a man of high intelligence, of great emotional\nsensibility, with a tendency to melancholy as well as a mystical\nidealism, of somewhat weak character, and prone to invoke Divine aid in\nthe slightest difficulty. It was a temperament that might be considered\na little morbid, outside a monastery, but it was not insane, nor is\nthere any known insanity among his near relations. This man's wife,\nPorzia, Tasso's mother, arouses the enthusiasm of all who ever mention\nher, as a creature of angelic perfection. No insanity here either, but\nsomething of the same undue sensitiveness and melancholy as in the\nfather, the same absence of the coarser and more robust virtues.\nMoreover, she belonged to a family by no means so angelic as herself,\nnot insane, but abnormal--malevolent, cruel, avaricious, almost\ncriminal. The most scrupulous modern alienist would hesitate to deprive\neither Bernardo or Porzia of the right to parenthood. Yet, as we know,\nthe son born of this union was not only a world-famous poet, but an\nexceedingly unhappy, abnormal, and insane man.\n\nLet us take the case of another still greater and more famous man,\nRousseau. It cannot reasonably be doubted that, at some moments in his\nlife at all events, and perhaps during a considerable period, Rousseau\nwas definitely insane. We are intimately acquainted with the details\nof the life and character of his relations and of his ancestry. We not\nonly possess the full account he set forth at the beginning of his\n_Confessions_, but we know very much more than Rousseau knew. Geneva\nwas paternal--paternal in the most severe sense--in scrutinising every\nunusual act of its children, and castigating every slightest deviation\nfrom the straight path. The whole life of the citizens of old Geneva may\nbe read in Genevan archives, and not a scrap of information concerning\nthe conduct of Rousseau's ancestors and relatives as set down in these\narchives but has been brought to the light of day. If there is any great\nman of genius whom the activities of these fanatical eugenists would have\nrendered impossible, it must surely have been Rousseau. Let us briefly\nexamine his parentage. Rousseau's father was the outcome of a fine stock\nwhich for two generations had been losing something of its fine\nqualities, though without sinking anywhere near insanity, criminality, or\npauperism. The Rousseaus still exercised their craft with success; they\nwere on the whole esteemed; Jean-Jacques's father was generally liked,\nbut he was somewhat unstable, romantic, with no strong sense of duty,\nhot-tempered, easily taking offence. The mother, from a modern\nstandpoint, was an attractive, highly accomplished, and admirable woman.\nIn her neighbours' eyes she was not quite Puritanical enough,\nhigh-spirited, independent, adventurous, fond of innocent gaiety, but a\ndevoted wife when, at last, at the age of thirty, she married. More than\nonce before marriage she was formally censured by the ecclesiastical\nauthorities for her little insubordinations, and these may be seen to\nhave a certain significance when we turn to her father; he was a thorough\n_mauvais sujet_, with an incorrigible love of pleasure, and constantly\nfalling into well-deserved trouble for some escapade with the young women\nof Geneva. Thus on both sides there was a certain nervous instability, an\nuncontrollable wayward emotionality. But of actual insanity, of nervous\ndisorder, of any decided abnormality or downright unfitness in either\nfather or mother, not a sign. Isaac Rousseau and Susanne Bernard would\nhave been passed by the most ferocious eugenist. It is again a case in\nwhich the chances of convergent heredity have produced a result which in\nits magnitude, in its heights and in its depths, none could foresee. It\nis one of the most famous and most accurately known examples of insane\ngenius in history, and we see what amount of support it offers to the\nponderous dictum concerning the insane heredity of genius.\n\nLet us turn from insanity to grave nervous disease. Epilepsy at once\ncomes before us, all the more significantly since it has been\nconsidered, more especially by Lombroso, to be the special disease\nthrough which genius peculiarly manifests itself. It is true that much\nimportance here is attached to those minor forms of epilepsy which\ninvolve no gross and obvious convulsive fit. The existence of these\nminor attacks is, in the case of men of genius, usually difficult to\ndisprove and equally difficult to prove. It certainly should not be so\nas regards the major form of epilepsy. Yet among the thousand and\nthirty persons of British genius I was only able to find epilepsy\nmentioned twice, and in both cases incorrectly, for the National\nBiographer had attributed it to Lord Herbert of Cherbury through\nmisreading a passage in Herbert's _Autobiography_, while the epileptic\nfits of Sir W.R. Hamilton in old age were most certainly not true\nepilepsy. Without doubt, no eugenist could recommend an epileptic to\nbecome a parent. But if epilepsy has no existence in British men of\ngenius it is improbable that it has often occurred among their parents.\nThe loss to British genius through eugenic activity in this sphere\nwould probably, therefore, have been _nil_.\n\nPutting aside British genius, however, one finds that it has been\nalmost a commonplace of alienists and neurologists, even up to the\npresent day, to present glibly a formidable list of mighty men of\ngenius as victims of epilepsy. Thus I find a well-known American\nalienist lately making the unqualified and positive statement that\n\"Mahomet, Napoleon, Moliere, Handel, Paganini, Mozart, Schiller,\nRichelieu, Newton and Flaubert\" were epileptics, while still more\nrecently a distinguished English neurologist, declaring that \"the\nworld's history has been made by men who were either epileptics,\ninsane, or of neuropathic stock,\" brings forward a similar and still\nlarger list to illustrate that statement, with Alexander the Great,\nJulius Caesar, the Apostle Paul, Luther, Frederick the Great and many\nothers thrown in, though unfortunately he fails to tell us which\nmembers of the group he desires us to regard as epileptic. Julius\nCaesar was certainly one of them, but the statement of Suetonius (not\nan unimpeachable authority in any case) that Caesar had epileptic fits\ntowards the close of his life is disproof rather than proof of true\nepilepsy. Of Mahomet, and St. Paul also, epilepsy is alleged. As\nregards the first, the most competent authorities regard the convulsive\nseizures attributed to the Prophet as perhaps merely a legendary\nattempt to increase the awe he inspired by unmistakable evidence of\ndivine authority. The narrative of St. Paul's experience on the road to\nDamascus is very unsatisfactory evidence on which to base a medical\ndiagnosis, and it may be mentioned that, in the course of a discussion\nin the columns of the _British Medical Journal_ during 1910, as many as\nsix different views were put forward as to the nature of the Apostle's\n\"thorn in the flesh.\" The evidence on which Richelieu, who was\nundoubtedly a man of very fragile constitution is declared to be\nepileptic, is of the very slenderest character. For the statement that\nNewton was epileptic there is absolutely no reliable evidence at all,\nand I am quite ignorant of the grounds on which Mozart, Handel and\nSchiller are declared epileptics. The evidence for epilepsy in Napoleon\nmay seem to carry slightly more weight, for there is that in the moral\ncharacter of Napoleon which we might very well associate with the\nepileptic temperament. It seems clear that Napoleon really had at times\nconvulsive seizures which were at least epileptoid. Thus Talleyrand\ndescribes how one day, just after dinner (it may be recalled that\nNapoleon was a copious and exceedingly rapid eater), passing for a few\nminutes into Josephine's room, the Emperor came out, took Talleyrand\ninto his own room, ordered the door to be closed, and then fell down in\na fit. Bourrienne, however, who was Napoleon's private secretary for\neleven years, knew nothing about any fits. It is not usual, in a true\nepileptic fit, to be able to control the circumstances of the seizure\nto this extent, and if Napoleon, who lived so public a life, furnished\nso little evidence of epilepsy to his environment, it may be regarded\nas very doubtful whether any true epilepsy existed, and on other\ngrounds it seems highly improbable.[3]\n\nOf all these distinguished persons in the list of alleged epileptics,\nit is naturally most profitable to investigate the case of the latest,\nFlaubert, for here it is easiest to get at the facts. Maxime du Camp, a\nfriend in early life, though later incompatibility of temperament led\nto estrangement, announced to the world in his _Souvenirs_ that\nFlaubert was an epileptic, and Goncourt mentions in his _Journal_ that\nhe was in the habit of taking much bromide. But the \"fits\" never began\nuntil the age of twenty-eight, which alone should suggest to a\nneurologist that they are not likely to have been epileptic; they never\noccurred in public; he could feel the fit coming on and would go and\nlie down; he never lost consciousness; his intellect and moral\ncharacter remained intact until death. It is quite clear that there was\nno true epilepsy here, nor anything like it.[4] Flaubert was of fairly\nsound nervous heredity on both sides, and his father, a distinguished\nsurgeon, was a man of keen intellect and high character. The novelist,\nwho was of robust physical and mental constitution, devoted himself\nstrenuously and exclusively to intellectual work; it is not surprising\nthat he was somewhat neurasthenic, if not hysterical, and Dumesnil, who\ndiscusses this question in his book on Flaubert, concludes that the\n\"fits\" may be called hysterical attacks of epileptoid form.\n\nIt may well be that we have in Flaubert's case a clue to the \"epilepsy\"\nof the other great men who in this matter are coupled with him. They\nwere nearly all persons of immense intellectual force, highly charged\nwith nervous energy; they passionately concentrated their energy on the\nachievement of life tasks of enormous magnitude, involving the highest\ntension of the organism. Under such conditions, even in the absence of\nall bad heredity or of actual disease, convulsive discharges may occur.\nWe may see even in healthy and sound women that occasionally some\nphysiological and unrelieved overcharging of the organism with nervous\nenergy may result in what is closely like a hysterical fit, while even\na violent fit of crying is a minor manifestation of the same tendency.\nThe feminine element in genius has often been emphasised, and it may\nwell be that under the conditions of the genius-life when working at\nhigh pressure we have somewhat similar states of nervous overcharging,\nand that from time to time the tension is relieved, naturally and\nspontaneously, by a convulsive discharge. This, at all events, seems a\npossible explanation.\n\nIt is rather strange that in these recklessly confident lists of\neminent \"epileptics\" we fail to find the one man of distinguished\ngenius whom perhaps we are justified in regarding as a true epileptic.\nDostoievsky appears to have been an epileptic from an early age; he\nremained liable to epileptic fits throughout life, and they plunged him\ninto mental dejection and confusion. In many of his novels we find\npictures of the epileptic temperament, evidently based on personal\nexperience, showing the most exact knowledge and insight into all the\nphases of the disease. Moreover, Dostoievsky in his own person appears\nto have displayed the perversions and the tendency to mental\ndeterioration which we should expect to find in a true epileptic. So\nfar as our knowledge goes, he really seems to stand alone as a\nmanifestation of supreme genius combined with epilepsy. Yet, as Dr.\nLoygue remarks in his medico-psychological study of the great Russian\nnovelist, epilepsy only accounts for half of the man, and leaves\nunexplained his passion for work; \"the dualism of epilepsy and genius\nis irreducible.\"\n\nThere is one other still more recent man of true genius, though not of\nthe highest rank, who may possibly be counted as epileptic: Vincent van\nGogh, the painter.[5] A brilliant and highly original artist, he was a\ndefinitely abnormal man who cannot be said to have escaped mental\ndeterioration. Simple and humble and suffering, recklessly sacrificing\nhimself to help others, always in trouble, van Gogh had many points of\nresemblance to Dostoievsky. He has, indeed, been compared to the\n\"Idiot\" immortalised by Dostoievsky, in some aspects an imbecile, in\nsome aspects a saint. Yet epilepsy no more explains the genius of van\nGogh than it explains the genius of Dostoievsky.\n\nThus the impression we gain when, laying aside prejudice, we take a\nfairly wide and impartial survey of the facts, or even when we\ninvestigate in detail the isolated facts to which significance is most\noften attached, by no means supports the notion that genius springs\nentirely, or even mainly, from insane and degenerate stocks. In some\ncases, undoubtedly, it is found in such stocks, but the ability\ndisplayed in these cases is rarely, perhaps never, of any degree near\nthe highest. It is quite easy to point to persons of a certain\nsignificance, especially in literature and art, who, though themselves\nsane, possess many near relatives who are highly neurotic and sometimes\ninsane. Such cases, however, are far from justifying any confident\ngeneralisations concerning the intimate dependence of genius on\ninsanity.\n\nWe see, moreover, that to conclude that men of genius are rarely or\nnever the offspring of a radically insane parentage is not to assume\nthat the parents of men of genius are usually of average normal\nconstitution. That would in any case be improbable. Apart from the\ntendency to convergent heredity already emphasised, there is a wider\ntendency to slight abnormality, a minor degree of inaptness for\nordinary life in the parentage of genius. I found that in 5 per cent.\ncases (certainly much below the real mark) of the British people of\ngenius, one parent, generally the father, had shown abnormality from a\nsocial or parental point of view. He had been idle, or extravagant, or\nrestless, or cruel, or intemperate, or unbusinesslike, in the great\nmajority of these cases \"unsuccessful.\" The father of Dickens\n(represented by his son in Micawber), who was always vainly expecting\nsomething to turn up, is a good type of these fathers of genius.\nShakespeare's father may have been of much the same sort. George\nMeredith's father, again, who was too superior a person for the\noutfitting business he inherited, but never succeeded in being anything\nelse, is another example of this group of fathers of genius. The father\nin these cases is a link of transition between the normal stock and its\nbrilliantly abnormal offshoot. In this transitional stage we see, as it\nwere, the stock _reculer pour mieux sauter_, but it is in the son that\nthe great leap is made manifest.\n\nThis peculiarity will serve to indicate that in a large proportion of\ncases the parentage of genius is not entirely sound and normal. We must\ndismiss absolutely the notion that the parents of persons of genius\ntend to exhibit traits of a grossly insane or nervously degenerate\ncharacter. The evidence for such a view is confined to a minute\nproportion of cases, and even then is usually doubtful. But it is\nanother matter to assume that the parentage of genius is absolutely\nnormal, and still less can we assert that genius always springs from\nentirely sound stocks. The statement is sometimes made that all\nfamilies contain an insane element. That statement cannot be accepted.\nThere are many people, including people of a high degree of ability,\nwho can trace no gross mental or nervous disease in their families,\nunless remote branches are taken into account. Not many statistics\nbearing on this point are yet available. But Jenny Roller, in a very\nthorough investigation, found at Zurich in 1895 that \"healthy\" people\nhad in 28 per cent. cases directly, and in 59 per cent. cases\nindirectly and altogether, a neuropathic heredity, while Otto Diem in\n1905 found that the corresponding percentages were still higher--33 and\n69. It should not, therefore, be matter for surprise if careful\ninvestigation revealed a traceable neuropathic element at least as\nfrequent as this in the families which produce a man of genius.\n\nIt may further, I believe, be argued that the presence of a neuropathic\nelement of this kind in the ancestry of genius is frequently not\nwithout a real significance. Aristotle said in his _Poetics_ that\npoetry demanded a man with \"a touch of madness,\" though the ancients,\nwho frequently made a similar statement to this, had not our modern\nideas of neuropathic heredity in their minds, but merely meant that\ninspiration simulated insanity. Yet \"a touch of madness,\" a slight\nmorbid strain, usually neurotic or gouty, in a preponderantly robust\nand energetic stock, seems to be often of some significance in the\nevolution of genius; it appears to act, one is inclined to think, as a\nkind of ferment, leading to a process out of all relation to its own\nmagnitude. In the sphere of literary genius, Milton, Flaubert, and\nWilliam Morris may help to illustrate this precious fermentative\ninfluence of a minor morbid element in vitally powerful stocks. Without\nsome such ferment as this the energy of the stock, one may well\nsuppose, might have been confined within normal limits; the rare and\nexquisite flower of genius, we know, required an abnormal stimulation;\nonly in this sense is there any truth at all in Lombroso's statement\nthat the pearl of genius develops around a germ of disease. But this is\nthe utmost length to which the facts allow us to go in assuming the\npresence of a morbid element as a frequent constituent of genius. Even\nthen we only have one of the factors of genius, to which, moreover,\nundue importance cannot be attached when we remember how often this\nferment is present without any resultant process of genius. And we are\nin any case far removed from any of those gross nervous lesions which\nall careful guardianship of the race must tend to eliminate.\n\nThus we are brought back to the point from which we started. Would\neugenics stamp out genius? There is no need to minimise the fact that a\ncertain small proportion of men of genius have displayed highly morbid\ncharacters, nor to deny that in a large proportion of cases a slightly\nmorbid strain may with care be detected in the ancestry of genius. But\nthe influence of eugenic considerations can properly be brought to bear\nonly in the case of grossly degenerate stocks. Here, so far as our\nknowledge extends, the parentage of genius nearly always escapes. The\ndestruction of genius and its creation alike elude the eugenist. If\nthere is a tendency in modern civilisation towards a diminution in the\nmanifestations of genius--which may admit of question---it can scarcely\nbe due to any threatened elimination of corrupt stocks. It may perhaps\nmore reasonably be sought in the haste and superficiality which our\npresent phase of urbanisation fosters, and only the most robust genius\ncan adequately withstand.\n\n\n[1] A Danish alienist, Lange, has, however, made an attempt on a\nstatistical basis to show a connection between mental ability and mental\ndegeneracy. (F. Lange, _Degeneration in Families_, translated from the\nDanish, 1907). He deals with 44 families which have provided 428 insane\nor neuropathic persons within a few generations, and during the same\nperiod a large number also of highly distinguished members, Cabinet\nministers, bishops, artists, poets, etc. But Lange admits that the forms\nof insanity found in these families are of a slight and not severe\ncharacter, while it is clear that the forms of ability are also in most\ncases equally slight; they are mostly \"old\" families, such as naturally\nproduce highly-trained and highly placed individuals. Moreover, Lange's\nmethods and style of writing are not scientifically exact, and he fails\nto define precisely what he means by a \"family.\" His investigation\nindicates that there is a frequent tendency for men of ability to belong\nto families which are not entirely sound, and that is a conclusion which\nis not seriously disputed.\n\n[2] Havelock Ellis, _A Study of British Genius_, 1904.\n\n[3] Dr. Cabanes (_Indiscretions de l'Histoire_, 3rd series) similarly\nconcludes that, while in temperament Napoleon may be said to belong to\nthe epileptic class, he was by no means an epileptic in the ordinary\nsense. Kanngiesser (_Prager Medizinische Wochenschrift_, 1912, No. 27)\nsuggests that from his slow pulse (40 to 60) Napoleon's attacks may have\noriginated in the heart and vessels.\n\n[4] Genuine epilepsy usually comes on before the age of twenty-five; it\nvery rarely begins after twenty-five, and never after thirty. (L.W.\nWeber, _Muenchener Medizinische Wochenschrift_, July 30th and Aug. 6th,\n1912.) In genuine epilepsy, also, loss of consciousness accompanies the\nfits; the exceptions to this rule are rare, though Audenino, a pupil of\nLombroso, who sought to extend the sphere of epilepsy, believes that\nthe exceptions are not so rare as is commonly supposed (_Archivio di\nPsichiatria_, fasc. VI., 1906). Moreover, true epilepsy is accompanied\nby a progressive mental deterioration which terminates in dementia; in\nthe Craig Colony for Epileptics of New York, among 3,000 epileptics\nthis progressive deterioration is very rarely absent (_Lancet_, March\n1st, 1913); but it is not found in the distinguished men of genius who\nare alleged to be epileptic. Epileptic deterioration has been\nelaborately studied by MacCurdy, _Psychiatric Bulletin_, New York,\nApril, 1916.\n\n[5] See, _e.g._, Elizabeth du Quesne van Gogh, _Personal Recollections\nof Vincent van Gogh_, p. 46. These epileptic attacks are, however, but\nvaguely mentioned, and it would seem that they only appeared during the\nlast years of the artist's life.\n\n\n\n\nXIV\n\n\nTHE PRODUCTION OF ABILITY\n\nThe growing interest in eugenics, and the world-wide decline in the\nbirth-rate, have drawn attention to the study of the factors which\ndetermine the production of genius in particular and high ability in\ngeneral. The interest in this question, thus freshly revived and made\nmore acute by the results of the Great War, is not indeed new. It is\nnearly half a century since Galton wrote his famous book on the heredity\nof genius, or, as he might better have described the object of his\ninvestigation, the heredity of ability. At a later date my own _Study of\nBritish Genius_ collectively summarised all the biological data available\nconcerning the parentage and birth of the most notable persons born in\nEngland, while numerous other studies might also be named.\n\nSuch investigations are to-day acquiring a fresh importance, because,\nwhile it is becoming realised that we are gaining a new control over the\nconditions of birth, the production of children has itself gained in\nimportance. The world is no longer bombarded by an exuberant stream of\nbabies, good, bad, and indifferent in quality, with Mankind to look on\ncalmly at the struggle for existence among them. Whether we like it or\nnot, the quantity is relatively diminishing, and the question of quality\nis beginning to assume a supreme significance. What are the conditions\nwhich assure the finest quality in our children?\n\nA German scientist, Dr. Vaerting, of Berlin, published on the eve of\nthe War a little book on the most favourable age in parents for the\nproduction of children of ability (_Das guenstigste elterliche\nZeugungsalter_).[1] He approaches the question entirely in this new\nspirit, not as a merely academic topic of discussion, but as a practical\nmatter of vital importance to the welfare of society. He starts with the\nassertion that \"our century has been called the century of the child,\"[2]\nand for the child all manner of rights are now being claimed. But the\nprime right of all, the right of the child to the best ability that his\nparents are able to transmit to him, is never even so much as considered.\nYet this right is the root of all children's rights. And when the\nmysteries of procreation have been so far revealed as to enable this\nright to be won, we shall, at the same time, Dr. Vaerting adds, renew\nthe spiritual aspect of the nations.\n\nThe most easily ascertainable and measurable factor in the production of\nability, and certainly a factor which cannot be without significance, is\nthe age of the parents at the child's birth. It is this factor with which\nVaerting is mainly concerned, as illustrated by over one hundred German\nmen of genius concerning whom he has been able to obtain the required\ndata. Later on, he proposes to extend the inquiry to other nations.\n\nVaerting finds--and this is probably the most original, though, as we\nshall see, not the most unquestionable of his findings--that the\nfathers who are themselves of no notable intellectual distinction have\na decidedly more prolonged power of procreating distinguished children\nthan is possessed by distinguished fathers. The former, that is to say,\nmay become the fathers of eminent children from the period of sexual\nmaturity up to the age of forty-three or beyond. When, however, the\nfather is himself of high intellectual distinction, Vaerting finds that\nhe was nearly always under thirty, and usually under twenty-five years\nof age at his distinguished son's birth, although the proportion of\nyouthful fathers in the general population is relatively small. The\neleven youngest fathers on Vaerting's list, from twenty-one to\ntwenty-five years of age, were (with one exception) themselves more or\nless distinguished, while the fifteen oldest, from thirty-nine to sixty\nyears of age, were all without exception undistinguished. Among these\nsons are to be found much greater names (Goethe, Bach, Kant, Bismarck,\nWagner, etc.) than are to be found among the sons of young and more\ndistinguished fathers, for here there is only one name (Frederick the\nGreat) of the same calibre. The elderly fathers belonged to large\ncities and were mostly married to wives very much younger than\nthemselves. Vaerting notes that the most eminent geniuses have most\nfrequently been the sons of fathers who were not engaged in\nintellectual avocations at all, but earned their livings as simple\ncraftsmen. He draws the conclusion from these data that strenuous\nintellectual energy is much more unfavourable than hard physical labour\nto the production of ability in the offspring. Intellectual workers,\ntherefore, he argues, must have their children when young, and we must\nso modify our social ideals and economic conditions as to render this\npossible. That the mother should be equally young is not, he holds,\nnecessary; he finds some superiority, indeed, provided the father is\nyoung, in somewhat elderly mothers, and there were no mothers under\ntwenty-three. The rarity of genius among the offspring of distinguished\nparents is attributed to the unfortunate tendency to marry too late,\nand Vaerting finds that the distinguished men who marry late rarely\nhave any children at all. Speaking generally, and apart from the\nproduction of genius, he holds that women have children too early,\nbefore their psychic development is completed, while men have children\ntoo late, when they have already \"in the years of their highest psychic\ngenerative fitness planted their most precious seed in the mud of the\nstreet.\"\n\nThe eldest child was found to have by far the best chance of turning\nout distinguished, and in this fact Vaerting finds further proof of\nhis argument. The third son has the next best chance, and then the\nsecond, the comparatively bad position of the second being attributed\nto the too brief interval which often follows the birth of the first\nchild. He also notes that of all the professions the clergy come\nbeyond comparison first as the parents of distinguished sons (who are,\nhowever, rarely of the highest degree of eminence), lawyers following,\nwhile officers in the army and physicians scarcely figure at all.\nVaerting is inclined to see in this order, especially in the\npredominance of the clergy, the favourable influence of an unexhausted\nreserve of energy and a habit of chastity on intellectual\nprocreativeness. This is one of his main conclusions.\n\nIt so happens that in my own _Study of British Genius_, with which Dr.\nVaerting was unacquainted when he made his first investigation, I dealt\non a larger scale, and perhaps with somewhat more precise method, with\nmany of these same questions as they are illustrated by English genius.\nVaerting's results have induced me to re-examine and to some extent to\nmanipulate afresh the English data. My results, like Dr. Vaerting's,\nshowed a special tendency for genius to appear in the eldest child,\nthough there was no indication of notably early marriage in the\nparents.[3] I also found a similar predominance of the clergy among the\nfathers and a similar deficiency of army officers and physicians. The\nmost frequent age of the father was thirty-two years, but the average\nage of the father at the distinguished child's birth was 36.6 years,\nand when the fathers were themselves distinguished their age was not,\nas Vaerting found in Germany, notably low at the birth of their\ndistinguished sons, but higher than the general average, being 37.5\nyears. There have been fifteen distinguished English sons of\ndistinguished fathers, but instead of being nearly always under thirty\nand usually under twenty-five, as Vaerting found in Germany, the\nEnglish distinguished father has only five times been under thirty and\namong these five only twice under twenty-five. Moreover, precisely the\nmost distinguished of the sons (Francis Bacon and William Pitt) had the\noldest fathers and the least distinguished sons the youngest fathers.\n\nI made some attempt to ascertain whether different kinds of genius\ntend to be produced by fathers who were at different periods of life.\nI refrained from publishing the results as I doubted whether the\nnumbers dealt with were sufficiently large to carry any weight. It\nmay, however, be worth while to record them, as possibly they are\nsignificant. I made four classes of men of genius: (1) Men of\nReligion, (2) Poets, (3) Practical Men, and (4) Scientific Men and\nSceptics. (It must not, of course, be supposed that in this last group\nall the scientific men were sceptics, or all the sceptics scientific.)\nThe average age of the fathers at the distinguished son's birth was,\nin the first group, 35 years, in the second and third groups 37 years,\nand in the last group 40 years. (It may be noted, however, that the\nyoungest father of all in the history of British genius, aged sixteen,\nproduced Napier, who introduced logarithms.) It is difficult not to\nbelieve that as regards, at all events, the two most discrepant\ngroups, the first and last, we here come on a significant indication.\nIt is not unreasonable to suppose that in the production of men of\nreligion, in whose activity emotion is so potent a factor, the\nyouthful age of the father should prove favourable, while for the\nproduction of genius of a more coldly intellectual and analytic type\nmore elderly fathers are demanded. If that should prove to be so, it\nwould become a source of happiness to religious parents to have their\nchildren early, while irreligious persons should be advised to delay\nparentage. It is scarcely necessary to remark that the age of the\nmothers is probably quite as influential as that of the fathers.\nConcerning the mothers, however, we always have less precise\ninformation. My records, so far as they go, agree with Vaerting's for\nGerman genius, in indicating that an elderly mother is more likely to\nproduce a child of genius than a very youthful mother. There were only\nfifteen mothers recorded under twenty-five years of age, while\nthirteen were over thirty-nine years; the most frequent age of the\nmothers was twenty-seven. On all these points we certainly need\ncontrolling evidence from other countries. Thus, before we insist with\nVaerting that an elderly mother is a factor in the production of\ngenius, we may recall that even in Germany the mothers of Goethe and\nNietzsche were both eighteen at their distinguished sons' birth. A\nrule which permits of such tremendous exceptions scarcely seems to\nbear the strain of emphasis.\n\nIt must always be remembered that while the study of genius is highly\ninteresting, and even, it is probable, not without significance for the\ngeneral laws of heredity, we must not too hastily draw conclusions from\nit to bear on practical questions of eugenics. Genius is rare and\nabnormal; laws meant to apply to the general population must be based\non a study of the general population. Vaerting, who is alive to the\npractical character which such problems are to-day assuming, realises\nhow inadequate it is to confine our study to genius. Marro, in his\nvaluable book on puberty, some years ago brought forward interesting\ndata showing the result of the age of the parents on the moral and\nintellectual characters of school-children in North Italy. He found\nthat children with fathers below twenty-six at their birth showed the\nmaximum of bad conduct and the minimum of good; they also yielded the\ngreatest proportion of children of irregular, troublesome, or lazy\ncharacter, but not of really perverse children who were equally\ndistributed among fathers of all ages. The largest number of cheerful\nchildren belonged to young fathers, while the children tended to become\nmore melancholy with ascending age of the fathers. Young fathers\nproduced the largest proportion of intelligent, as well as of\ntroublesome children, but when the very exceptionally intelligent\nchildren were considered separately they were found to be more usually\nthe offspring of elderly fathers. As regards the mothers, Marro found\nthat the children of young mothers (under twenty-one) are superior,\nboth as regards conduct and intelligence, though the more exceptionally\nintelligent children tended to belong to more mature mothers. When the\nparents were both in the same age-group the immature and the elderly\ngroups tended to produce more children who were unsatisfactory, both as\nregards conduct and intelligence, than the intermediate group.[4]\n\nBut we need to have such inquiries made on a more wholesale and\nsystematic scale. They are no longer of a merely speculative character.\nWe no longer regard children as the \"gifts of God,\" flung into our\nhelpless hands; we are beginning to realise that the responsibility is\nours to see that they come into the world under the best conditions,\nand at the moments when their parents are best fitted to produce them.\nVaerting proposes that it should be the business of all school\nauthorities to register the ages of the pupils' parents. This is\nscarcely a provision to which even the most susceptible parent could\nreasonably object, though there is no cause to make the declaration\ncompulsory where a \"conscientious\" objection existed, and in any case\nthe declaration would not be public. It would be an advantage--though\nthis might be more difficult to obtain--to have the date of the\nparents' marriage, and of the birth of previous children, as well as\nsome record of the father's standing in his occupation. But even the\nages of the parents alone would teach us much when correlated with the\nschool position of the pupil in intelligence and in conduct. It is\nquite true that there are unavoidable fallacies. We are not, as in the\ncase of genius, dealing with people whose life-work is complete and\nopen to the whole world's examination. The good and clever child is not\nnecessarily the forerunner of the first-class man or woman; and many\ncapable and successful men have been careless in attendance at lectures\nand rebellious to discipline. Moreover, the prejudice and limitations\nof the teachers have also to be recognised. Yet when we are dealing\nwith millions most of these fallacies would be smoothed out. We should\nbe, once for all, in a position to determine authoritatively the exact\nbearing of one of the simplest and most vital factors of the betterment\nof the race. We should be in possession of a new clue to guide us in\nthe creation of the man of the coming world. Why not begin to-day?\n\n\n[1] He has further discussed the subject in _Die Neue Generation_,\nAug.-Nov., 1914, and in a more recent (1916) pamphlet which I have not\nseen.\n\n[2] The reference is to _The Century of the Child_, by Ellen Key, who\nwrites (English translation, p. 2): \"My conviction is that the\ntransformation of human nature will take place, not when the whole of\nhumanity becomes Christian, but when the whole of humanity awakens to\nthe consciousness of the 'holiness of generation.' This consciousness\nwill make the central work of Society the new race, its origin, its\nmanagement, and its education; about these all morals, all laws, all\nsocial arrangements will be grouped.\"\n\n[3] It is not only ability, but idiocy, criminality and many other\nabnormalities which specially tend to appear in the first-born. The\neldest-born represents the point of greatest variation in the family,\nand the variation thus yielded may be in either direction, useful or\nuseless, good or bad. See, _e.g._, Havelock Ellis, _A Study of British\nGenius_, pp. 117-120. Soeren Hansen, \"The Inferior Quality of the\nFirst-born Children,\" _Eugenics Review_, Oct., 1913.\n\n[4] Marro, _La Puberta_ (French translation _La Puberte_), Ch. XI.\n\n\n\n\nXV\n\n\nMARRIAGE AND DIVORCE\n\nWe contemplate our marriage system with satisfaction. We remember the\nmany unquestionable evidences in favour of it, and we marvel that it so\noften proves a failure. For while we remember the evidence in favour of\nit, we forget the evidence against it, and we overlook the important\nfact that our favourable evidence is largely based on the vision of an\nabstract or idealised monogamy which fails to correspond to the\ndetailed and ever varying system which in practice we cherish. We point\nto the fact that monogamic marriage has probably flourished throughout\nthe history of the world, that it exists among savages, even among\nanimals, but we fail to observe how far that monogamy differs from\nours, even assuming that our monogamy is a real monogamy and not a\ndisguised polygamy, especially in the fact that it is a free union and\nonly subject to the inherent penalties that follow its infraction, not\nto external penalties. Ours is not free; our faith in its natural\nvirtues is not quite so firm as we assert; we are always meddling with\nit and worrying over its health and anxiously trying to bolster it up.\nWe are not by any means willing to let it rest on the sanction of its\nown natural or divine laws. Our feeling is, as James Hinton used\nironically to express it: \"Poor God with no one to help Him!\"\n\nThe fact is that when we compare our civilised marriage system with\nmarriage as it exists in Nature, we fail to realise a fundamental\ndistinction. Our marriage system is made up of two absolutely different\nelements which cannot blend. On the one hand, it is the manifestation\nof our deepest and most volcanic impulses. On the other hand, it is an\nelaborate web of regulations--legal, ecclesiastical, economic--which is\nto-day quite out of relation to our impulses. On the one hand, it is a\nforce which springs from within; on the other hand, it is a force which\npresses on us from without.[1] One says broadly that these two elements\nof marriage, as we understand it, are out of relation to each other.\nBut there is an important saving qualification to be made. The inner\nimpulse is not without law, and the external pressure is not without an\nultimate basis of nature. That is to say, that under free and natural\nconditions the inner impulse tends to develop itself, not licentiously\nbut with its own order and restraints, while, on the other hand, our\ninherited regulations are largely the tradition of ancient attempts to\nfix and register that natural order and restraint. The disharmony comes\nin with the fact that our regulations are traditional and ancient, not\nour own attempts to fix and register the natural order but inextricably\nmixed up with elements that are entirely alien to our civilised habits\nof life. Whatever our attitude towards mediaeval Canon Law may\nbe--whether reverence or indifference or disgust--it yet holds us and\nis ingrained into our marriage system to-day. Canon Law was a good and\nvital thing under the conditions which produced it. The survival of\nCanon Law to-day, with the antiquated and ascetic conception of the\nsubordination of women associated with it, is the chief reason why we\nin the twentieth century have not yet progressed so far towards a\nreasonable system of marriage as the Romans had reached on the basis of\ntheir law, nearly two thousand years ago.[2] Marriage is conditioned\nboth by inner impulse and outward pressure. But a healthy impulse\nbears within it an order and restraint of its own, while a truly moral\noutward pressure is based, not on the demands of mediaeval days, but on\nthe demands of our own day.\n\nHow far this is from being the case yet we find well illustrated by our\ndivorce methods. All our modern culture favour a sense of the\nsacredness of the sexual relations; we cherish a delicate reserve\nconcerning all the intimacies of personal relationship. But when the\nmagic word \"Divorce\" is uttered we fling all our civilisation to the\nwinds, and in the desecrated name of Law we proceed to an inquisition\nwhich scarcely differs at all from those public tests of mediaeval\nlaw-courts which now we dare not venture even to put into words.\n\nIt is true that we are not bound to be consistent when it is an\nadvantage to be inconsistent. And if there were a method in our madness\nit would be justified. But there is no method. From first to last the\nhistory of divorce (read it, for instance, in Howard's _Matrimonial\nInstitutions_) is an ever shifting record of cruel blunders and\nridiculous absurdities. Divorce began in modern times in flagrant\ninjustice to one of the two partners, the wife, and it has ended--if we\nmay hope that the end is approaching--in imbecilities that to future\nages will be incredible. For no legal jargon has ever been invented\nthat will express the sympathies and the antipathies of human\nrelationship; they even escape the subtlest expression. Law-makers have\ntortured their brains to devise formulas which will cover the\nlegitimate grounds for divorce. How vain their efforts are is\nsufficiently shown by the fact that by no chance can they ever agree on\ntheir formulas, and that they are changing them constantly with\nfeverish haste, dimly realising that they are but the antiquated\nrepresentatives of mediaevalism, and that soon their occupation will be\ngone for ever.\n\nThe reasons for the making or the breaking of human relationships can\nnever be formulated. The only result of such legal formulas is that\nthey bring law into contempt because they have to be ingeniously and\nmethodically cheated in order to adapt them in any degree to civilised\nhuman needs. Thus such laws not only degrade the name of Law, but they\ndegrade the whole community which tolerates them. There is only one\nultimate reason for either marriage or divorce, and that is that the\ntwo persons concerned consent to the marriage or consent to the\ndivorce. Why they consent is no concern of any third party, and, maybe,\nthey cannot even put it into words.\n\nAt the same time, let us not forget, marriage and divorce are a very\nreal concern of the State, and law cannot ignore either. It is the\nbusiness of the State to see to it that no interests are injured. The\ncontract of marriage and the contract of divorce are private matters,\nbut it is necessary to guard that no injury is thereby done to either\nof the contracting persons, or to third parties, or to the community as\na whole. The State may have a right to say what persons are unfit for\nmarriage, or at all events for procreation; the State must take care\nthat the weaker party is not injured; the State is especially bound to\nwatch over the interests of children, and this involves, in the best\nissue, that each child shall have two effective parents, whether or not\nthose parents are living together. A large scope--we are beginning to\nrecognise--must be left alike to freedom of marriage and freedom of\ndivorce, but the State must mark out the limits within which that\nfreedom is exercised.\n\nThe loosening hold of the State on marriage is by no means connected\nwith any growing sense of the value of divorce. At the best, it is\nprobable that divorce is merely a necessary evil. One of the chief\nreasons why we should seek to promote education in relation to sexual\nrelationships and to inculcate the responsibilities of such\nrelationships, so making the approach to marriage more circumspect, is\nin order to obviate the need for divorce. For divorce is always a\nconfession of failure. Very often, indeed, it involves not only a\nconfession of failure in one particular marriage but of failure for\nmarriage generally. One notes how often the people who fail in a first\nmarriage fail even more hopelessly in the second. They have chosen the\nwrong partners; but one suspects that for them all partners will prove\nthe wrong partners. One sometimes hears nowadays that a succession of\nmarriage relationships is desirable in order to develop character. But\nthat depends on many things. It very much depends on what character\nthere is to develop. A man may have relationships with a hundred women\nand develop much less character out of his experience, and even acquire\na much less intimate knowledge of women, than the man who has spent his\nlife in an endless series of adventures with one woman. It depends a\ngood deal on the man and not a little on the woman.\n\nThus the work of marriage in the world must depend entirely on the\nnature of that world. A fine marriage system can only be produced by a\nfine civilisation of which it is the exquisite flower. Laws cannot\nbetter marriage; even education, by itself, is powerless, necessary as\nit is in conjunction with other influences. The love-relationships of\nmen and women must develop freely, and with due allowance for the\nvariations which the complexities of civilisation demand. But these\nrelationships touch the whole of life at so infinite a number of points\nthat they cannot even develop at all save in a society that is itself\ndeveloping graciously and harmoniously. Do not expect to pluck figs\nfrom thistles. As a society is, so will its marriages be.\n\n\n[1] It is this artificial and external pressure which often produces a\nrevolt against marriage. The author of a remarkable paper entitled,\n\"Our Incestuous Marriage,\" in the _Forum_ (Dec., 1915), advocates a\nreform of social marriage customs \"in conformance with the\nfreedom-loving modern nature,\" and the introduction of \"a fresh\natmosphere for married life in which personality can be made to appear\nso sacred and free that marriage will be undertaken and borne as\nlightly and gracefully as a secret sin.\"\n\n[2] See Sir James Donaldson, _Woman: Her Position and Influence in\nAncient Greece and Rome, 1907_; also S.B. Kitchin's excellent _History\nof Divorce_, 1912; this author believes that the tendency in modern\ncivilisation is to return to the simple principles of Roman law\ninvolving divorce by consent. See also Havelock Ellis, _Sex in Relation\nto Society_, Ch. X.\n\n\n\n\nXVI\n\n\nTHE MEANING OF THE BIRTH-RATE\n\nThe history of educated opinion concerning the birth-rate and its\ninterpretation during the past seventy years is full of interest. The\nactual operative factors--natural, pathological, economic, social, and\neducational--in raising or lowering the birth-rate, are numerous and\ncomplicated, and it is difficult to determine exactly how large a part\neach factor plays. But without determining that at all, it is still\nvery instructive to observe the evolution of popular intelligent\nopinion concerning the significance of a high and a low birth-rate.\n\nPopular opinion on this matter may be said to have passed through three\nstages. I am referring to Western Europe and more particularly to\nEngland and Germany, for it must be remembered that, in this matter,\nEngland and Germany are running a parallel course. England happens to\nbe, on the whole, a little ahead, having reached its period of full\nexpansion at a somewhat earlier period than Germany, but each people is\npursuing the same course.\n\nIn the first stage--let us say about the middle of the last century and\nthe succeeding thirty years--the popular attitude was one of jubilant\nsatisfaction in a high and rising birth-rate. There had been an immense\nexpansion of industry. The whole world seemed nothing but a great field\nfor the energetic and industrial nations to exploit. Workers were\nneeded to keep up with the expansion and to keep down wages to a rate\nwhich would make industrial expansion easy; soldiers and armaments were\nneeded to protect the movements of expansion. It seemed to the more\nexuberant spirits that a vast British Empire, or a mighty Pan-Germany,\nmight be expected to cover the whole world. France, with its low and\nfalling birth-rate, was looked down at with contempt as a decadent\ncountry inhabited by a degenerate population. No attempts to analyse\nthe birth-rate, to ascertain what are really the biological, social,\nand economic accompaniments of a high birth-rate, made any impression\non the popular mind. They were drowned in the general shout of\nexultation.\n\nThat era of optimism was followed by a swift reaction. Towards 1880 the\nupward movement of the birth-rate began to be arrested; it soon began\nsteadily to fall, as it is continuing to do to-day. In France it is\nfalling slowly, in Italy more rapidly, in England and Prussia still\nmore rapidly. As, however, the fall began earliest in France, the\nbirth-rate is lower there than in the other countries named; for the\nsame reason it is lower in England than in Prussia, although England\nstands in this respect at almost exactly the same distance from Prussia\nto-day as thirty years ago, the fall having occurred at the same rate\nin both countries. It is quite possible that in the future it may\nbecome more rapid in Prussia than in England, for the birth-rate of\nBerlin is lower than the birth-rate of London, and urbanisation is\nproceeding at a more rapid rate in Germany than in England.\n\nThe realisation of such facts as these produced a period of pessimism\nwhich marks the second stage in this evolution. The great movement of\nexpansion, which seemed to promise so much to ambitious nations anxious\nfor world-power, was being arrested. Moreover, it began to be realised\nthat the rapid growth of a community was accompanied by phenomena which\nhad not been foreseen by the enthusiasts of the first period of\noptimism. They had argued--not indeed verbally but in effect--that the\nhigher the birth-rate the cheaper labour and lives would become, and\nthe cheaper labour and lives were, the easier it would be for a nation\nwith its industrial armies and its military armies to get ahead of\nother rival nations. But they had not realised that, with the growth of\npopular education in modern democratic states, cheap labour is no\nlonger willing to play without protest this humble and suffering part\nin national progress. The workers of the nations began to declare,\nclearly or obscurely, as they were able, that they no longer intended\nto sell their labour and their lives so cheaply. The rising birth-rate\nof the middle of the nineteenth century coincided with, and to a large\nextent doubtless produced, the organisation of labour, trades unions,\nthe political activity of the working classes, Socialism, as well as\nthe extreme forms of Anarchism and Syndicalism. It was when these\nmovements began to attain a high degree of organisation and power that\nthe birth-rate began to decline. Thus the pessimists of the second\nperiod were faced by horrors on both sides. On the one hand, they saw\nthat the ever-increasing rate of human production which seemed to them\nthe essential condition of national, social, even moral progress, had\nnot only stopped but was steadily diminishing. On the other hand, they\nsaw that, even in so far as it was maintained, it involved, under\nmodern conditions, nothing but social commotion and economic\ndisturbance.\n\nThere are still many pessimists of this second period alive among us,\nand actively proclaiming their gospel of despair, alike in England and\nin Germany. But a new generation is growing up, and this question is\nnow entering a third period. The new generation rejects alike the\npassive optimism of the first period and the passive pessimism of the\nsecond period. Its attitude is hopeful but it realises that mere hope\nis vain unless there is clear intellectual vision and unless there is\nindividual and social action in accordance with that vision.\n\nIt is to-day beginning to be seen that the old notion of progress by\nmeans of reckless multiplication is vain. It can only be effected at a\nruinous cost of death, disease, poverty, and misery. We see this in the\npast history of Western Europe, as we still see it in the history of\nRussia. Any progress effected along that line--if \"progress\" it can be\ncalled--is now barred, for it is absolutely opposed to those democratic\nconceptions which are ever gaining greater influence among us.\n\nMoreover, we are now better able to analyse demographic phenomena and\nwe are no longer satisfied with any crude statements regarding the\nbirth-rate. We realise that they need interpretation. They have to be\nconsidered in relation to the sex-constitution and the age-constitution\nof the population, and, above all, they must be viewed in relation to\nthe infant mortality-rate. The bad aspect of the French birth-rate is\nnot so much its lowness as that it is accompanied by a high infantile\nmortality. The fact that the German birth-rate is higher than the\nEnglish ceases to be a matter of satisfaction when it is realised that\nGerman infantile mortality is vastly greater than English. A high\nbirth-rate is no sign of a high civilisation. But we are beginning to\nfeel that a high infantile death-rate is a sign of a very inferior\ncivilisation. A low birth-rate with a low infant death-rate not only\nproduces the same increase in the population as a high birth-rate with\nthe high death-rate, which always accompanies it (for there are no\nexamples of, a high birth-rate with a low death-rate), but it produces\nit in a way which is far more worthy of our admiration in this matter\nthan the way of Russia and China where opposite conditions prevail.[1]\n\nIt used to be thought that small families were immoral. We now begin to\nsee that it was the large families of old which were immoral. The\nexcessive birth-rate of the early industrial period was directly\nstimulated by selfishness. There were no laws against child-labour;\nchildren were produced that they might be sent out, when little more\nthan babies, to the factories and the mines to increase their parents'\nincomes. The diminished birth-rate has accompanied higher moral\ntransformation. It has introduced a finer economy into life, diminished\ndeath, disease, and misery. It is indirectly, and even directly,\nimproving the quality of the race. The very fact that children are born\nat longer intervals is not only beneficial to the mother's health, and\ntherefore to the children's general welfare, but it has been proved to\nhave a marked and prolonged influence on the physical development of\nchildren.\n\nSocial progress, and a higher civilisation, we thus see, involve a\nreduced birth-rate and a reduced death-rate; the fewer the children\nborn, the fewer the risks of death, disease, and misery to the children\nthat are born. The fact that civilisation involves small families is\nclearly shown by the tendency of the educated and upper social classes\nto have small families. As the proletariat class becomes educated and\nelevated, disciplined to refinement and to foresight--as it were\naristocratised--it also has small families. Civilisational progress is\nhere in a line with biological progress. The lower organisms spawn\ntheir progeny in thousands, the higher mammals produce but one or two\nat a time. The higher the race the fewer the offspring.\n\nThus diminution in quantity is throughout associated with augmentation\nin quality. Quality rather than quantity is the racial ideal now set\nbefore us, and it is an ideal which, as we are beginning to learn, it\nis possible to cultivate, both individually and socially. The day is\ncoming, as Engel remarks in his useful book on _The Elements of Child\nProtection_, when fatherhood and motherhood will only be permitted to\nthe strong. That is why the new science of eugenics or racial hygiene\nis acquiring so immense an importance. In the past racial selection has\nbeen carried out crudely by the destructive, wasteful, and expensive\nmethod of elimination, through death. In the future it will be carried\nout far more effectively by conscious and deliberate selection,\nexercised not merely before birth, but before conception and even\nbefore mating. It is idle to suppose that such a change can be exerted\nby mere legislation, for which, besides, our scientific knowledge is\nstill inadequate. We cannot, indeed, desire any compulsory elimination\nof the unfit or any regulated breeding of the fit. Such notions are\nidle. Man can only be bred from within, through the medium of his\nintelligence and will, working together under the control of a high\nsense of responsibility. Galton, who recognised the futility of mere\nlegislation to elevate the race, believed that the hope of the future\nlay in eugenics becoming a part of religion. The good of the race lies,\nnot in the production of a super-man, but of a super-humanity. This can\nonly be attained through personal individual development, the increase\nof knowledge, the sense of responsibility towards the race, enabling\nmen to act in accordance with responsibility. The leadership in\ncivilisation belongs not to the nation with the highest birth-rate but\nto the nation which has thus learnt to produce the finest men and\nwomen.\n\n\n[1] For a more detailed discussion of these points see the author's\n_Task of Social Hygiene_.\n\n\n\n\nXVII\n\n\nCIVILISATION AND THE BIRTH-RATE\n\nIt was inevitable that the Great War of to-day should lead to an\noutcry, in all the countries engaged, for more children and larger\nfamilies. In Germany and in Austria, in France and in England,\npanic-stricken fanatics are found who preach to the people that the\nbirth-rate is falling and the nation is decaying. No scheme is too wild\nfor the supposed benefit of the country in a fierce coming fight for\ncommercial supremacy, as well as with due regard to the requirements in\ncannon fodder of another Great War twenty years hence.\n\nIt may be well, however, to pause before we listen to these Quixotic\nplans.[1] We may then find reason to think, not only that any attempt\nto arrest the falling birth-rate is scarcely likely to be effective in\nview of the fact that it affects not one country only but all the\ncountries that count, but that even if it could be successful it would\nbe mischievous. Whatever the results of the War may be, one result\nis fairly certain and that is that, under the most favourable\ncircumstances, every country will emerge laden with misery and debt;\nwhatever prosperity may follow, living will be expensive for a long\ntime to come and the incomes of all classes heavily burdened. A Bounty\non Babies would hardly make up for these difficulties. The happy\nfamily, under the conditions that seem to be immediately ahead of us,\nis likely to be the small family. The large family--as indeed has been\nthe case in the past--is likely to be visited by disease and death.\n\nBut there is more to be said than this. We must dismiss altogether the\nstatement so often made that a falling birth-rate means \"an old and\ndying community.\" The Germans have for years been making this remark\ncontemptuously regarding the French. But to-day they have to recognise\na vitality in the French which they had not expected, while in recent\nyears, also, their own birth-rate has been falling more rapidly than\nthat of France. Nor is it true that a falling birth-rate means a\nfalling population; the French birth-rate has long been steadily\nfalling, yet the French population has been steadily increasing all the\ntime, though less rapidly than it would had not the death-rate been\nabnormally high. It is not the number of babies born that counts, but\nthe net result in surviving children. An enormous number of babies are\nborn in China; but an enormous number die while still babies. So that\nit is better to have a few babies of good quality than a large number\nof indifferent quality, for the falling birth-rate is more than\ncompensated by the falling death-rate. That is what we are attaining in\nEngland, and, as we know, our steadily falling birth-rate results in a\nsteadily growing population.\n\nThere is still more to be said. Small families and a falling birth-rate\nare not merely no evil, they are a positive good. They are a gain for\nhumanity. They represent an evolutionary rise in Nature and a higher\nstage in civilisation. We are here in the presence of great fundamental\nprinciples of progress which have been working through life from the\nbeginning.\n\nAt the beginning of life on the earth reproduction ran riot. Of one\nminute organism it is estimated that, if its reproduction were not\nchecked by death or destruction, in thirty days it would form a mass a\nmillion times larger than the sun. The conger-eel lays fifteen million\neggs, and if they all grew up, and reproduced themselves on the same\nscale, in two years the whole sea would become a wriggling mass of\nfish. As we approach the higher forms of life reproduction gradually\ndies down. The animals nearest to man produce few offspring, but they\nsurround them with parental care, until they are able to lead\nindependent lives with a fair chance of surviving. The whole process\nmay be regarded as a mechanism for slowly subordinating quantity to\nquality, and so promoting the evolution of life to ever higher stages.\n\nThis process, which is plain to see on the largest scale throughout\nliving nature, may be more minutely studied, as it acts within a\nnarrower range, in the human species. Here we statistically formulate\nit in the terms of birth-rate and death-rate; by the mutual relationship\nof the two courses of the birth-rate and the death-rate we are able to\nestimate the evolutionary rank of a nation, and the degree in which it\nhas succeeded in subordinating the primitive standard of quantity to\nthe higher and later standard of quality.\n\nIt is especially in Europe that we can investigate this relationship by\nthe help of statistics which in some cases extend for nearly a century\nback. We can trace the various phases through which each nation passes,\nthe effects of prosperity, the influence of education and sanitary\nimprovement, the general complex development of civilisation, in each\ncase moving forward, though not regularly and steadily, to higher\nstages by means of a falling birth-rate, which is to some extent\ncompensated by a falling death-rate, the two rates nearly always\nrunning parallel, so that a temporary rise in the birth-rate is usually\naccompanied by a rise in the death-rate, by a return, that is to say,\ntowards the conditions which we find at the beginning of animal life,\nand a steady fall in the birth-rate is always accompanied by a fall in\nthe death-rate.\n\nThe modern phase of this movement, soon after which our precise\nknowledge begins, may be said to date from the industrial expansion,\ndue to the introduction of machinery, which Professor Marshall places\nin England about the year 1760. That represents the beginning of an era\nin which all civilised and semi-civilised countries are still living.\nFor the earlier centuries we lack precise data, but we are able to form\ncertain probable conclusions. The population of a country in those ages\nseems to have grown very slowly and sometimes even to have retrograded.\nAt the end of the sixteenth century the population of England and Wales\nis estimated at five millions and at the end of the seventeenth at six\nmillions--only 20 per cent. increase during the century--although\nduring the nineteenth century the population nearly quadrupled. This\nvery gradual increase of the population seems to have been by no means\ndue to a very low birth-rate, but to a very high death-rate. Throughout\nthe Middle Ages a succession of virulent plagues and pestilences\ndevastated Europe. Small-pox, which may be considered the latest of\nthese, used to sweep off large masses of the youthful population in the\neighteenth century. The result was a certain stability and a certain\nwell-being in the population as a whole, these conditions being,\nhowever, maintained in a manner that was terribly wasteful and\ndistressing.\n\nThe industrial revolution introduced a new era which began to show its\nfeatures clearly in the early nineteenth century. On the one hand, a\nnew motive had arisen to favour a more rapid increase of population.\nSmall children could tend machinery and thereby earn wages to increase\nthe family takings. This led to an immediate result in increased\npopulation and increased prosperity. But, on the other hand, the rapid\nincrease of population always tended to outrun the rapid increase of\nprosperity, and the more so since the rise of sanitary science began to\ndrive back the invasions of the grosser and more destructive infectious\ndiseases which had hitherto kept the population down. The result was\nthat new forms of disease, distress, and destitution arose; the old\nstability was lost, and the new prosperity produced unrest in place of\nwell-being. The social consciousness was still too immature to deal\ncollectively with the difficulties and frictions which the industrial\nera introduced, and the individualism which under former conditions had\noperated wholesomely now acted perniciously to crush the souls and\nbodies of the workers, whether men, women, or children.\n\nAs we know, the increase of knowledge and the growth of the social\nconsciousness have slowly acted wholesomely during the past century to\nremedy the first evil results of the industrial revolution. The\nartificial and abnormal increase of the population has been checked\nbecause it is no longer permissible in most countries to stunt the\nminds and bodies of small children by placing them in factories. An\nelaborate system of factory legislation was devised, and is still ever\ndrawing fresh groups of workers within its protective meshes. Sanitary\nscience began to develop and to exert an enormous influence on the\nhealth of nations. At the same time the supreme importance of popular\neducation was realised. The total result was that the nature of\n\"prosperity\" began to be transformed; instead of being, as it had been\nat the beginning of the industrial era, a direct appeal to the\ngratification of gross appetites and reckless lusts, it became an\nindirect stimulus to higher gratifications and more remote aspirations.\nForesight became a dominating motive even in the general population,\nand a man's anxiety for the welfare of his family was no longer\nforgotten in the pleasure of the moment. The social state again became\nmore stable, and mere \"prosperity\" was transformed into civilisation.\nThis is the state of things now in progress in all industrial\ncountries, though it has reached varying levels of development among\ndifferent peoples.\n\nIt is thus clear that the birth-rate combined with the death-rate\nconstitutes a delicate instrument for the measurement of civilisation,\nand that the record of their combined curves registers the upward or\ndownward course of every nation. The curves, as we know, tend to be\nparallel, and when they are not parallel we are in the presence of a\nrare and abnormal state of things which is usually temporary or\ntransitional.\n\nIt is instructive from this point of view to study the various nations\nof Europe, for here we find a large number of small nations, each with\nits own statistical system, confined within a small space and living\nunder fairly uniform conditions. Let us take the latest official\nfigures (which are usually for 1913) and attempt to measure the\ncivilisation of European countries on this basis. Beginning with the\nlowest birth-rate, and therefore in gradually descending rank of\nsuperiority, we find that the European countries stand in the following\norder: France, Belgium, Ireland, Sweden, the United Kingdom,\nSwitzerland, Norway, Scotland, Denmark, Holland, the German Empire,\nPrussia, Finland, Spain, Austria, Italy, Hungary, Serbia, Bulgaria,\nRoumania, Russia. If we take the death-rate similarly, beginning with\nthe lowest rate and gradually proceeding to the highest, we find the\nfollowing order: Holland, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland, the\nUnited Kingdom, Belgium, Scotland, Prussia, the German Empire, Finland,\nIreland, France, Italy, Austria, Serbia, Spain, Bulgaria, Hungary,\nRoumania, Russia.\n\nNow we cannot accept the birth-rates and death-rates of the various\ncountries exactly at their face value. Temporary conditions, as well as\nthe special composition of a population, not to mention peculiarities\nof registration, exert a disturbing effect. Roughly and on the whole,\nhowever, the figures are acceptable. It is instructive to find how\nclosely the two rates agree. The agreement is, indeed, greater at the\nbottom than at the top; the eight countries which constitute the lowest\ngroup as regards birth-rate are the identical eight countries which\nfurnish the heaviest death-rates. That was to be expected; a very high\nbirth-rate seems fatally to involve a very high death-rate. But a very\nlow birth-rate (as we see in the cases of France and Ireland) is not\ninvariably associated with a very low death-rate, though it is never\nassociated with a high death-rate. This seems to indicate that those\nqualities in a highly civilised nation which restrain the production of\noffspring do not always or at once produce the eugenic racial qualities\npossessed by hardier peoples living under simpler conditions. But with\nthese reservations it is not difficult to combine the two lists in a\nfairly concordant order of descending rank. Most readers will agree,\nthat taking the European populations in bulk, without regard to the\nproduction of genius (for men of genius are always a very minute\nfraction of a nation), the European populations which they are\naccustomed to regard as standing at the head in the general diffusion\nof character, intelligence, education, and well-being, are all included\nin the first twelve or thirteen nations, which are the same in both\nlists though they do not follow the same order. These peoples, as\npeoples--that is, without regard to their size, their political\nimportance, or their production of genius--represent the highest level\nof democratic civilisation in Europe.\n\nIt is scarcely necessary to add that various countries outside Europe\nequal or excel them; the death-rate of the United States, so far as\nstatistics show, is the same as that of Sweden; that of Ontario, still\nbetter, is the same as Denmark; while the death-rate of the Australian\nCommonwealth, with a medium birth-rate, is lower than that of any\nEuropean country, and New Zealand holds the world's championship in\nthis field with the lowest death-rate of all. On the other hand, some\nextra-European countries compare less favourably with Europe; Japan,\nwith a rather high birth-rate, has the same high death-rate as Spain,\nand Chile, with a still higher birth-rate, has a higher death-rate than\nRussia. So it is that among human peoples we find the same laws\nprevailing as among animals, and the higher nations of the world differ\nfrom those which are less highly evolved precisely as the elephant\ndiffers from the herring, though within a narrower range, that is to\nsay, by producing fewer offspring and taking better care of them.\n\nThe whole of this evolutionary process, we have to remember, is a\nnatural process. It has been going on from the beginning of the living\nworld. But at a certain stage in the higher development of man, without\nceasing to be natural, it becomes conscious and deliberate. It is then\nthat we have what may properly be termed _Birth Control_. That is to\nsay, that a process which had before been working slowly through the\nages, attaining every new forward step with waste and pain, is\nhenceforth carried out voluntarily, in the light of the high human\nqualities of reason and foresight and self-restraint. The rise of birth\ncontrol may be said to correspond with the rise of social and sanitary\nscience in the first half of the nineteenth century, and to be indeed\nan essential part of that movement. It is firmly established in all the\nmost progressive and enlightened countries of Europe, notably in France\nand in England; in Germany, where formerly the birth-rate was very\nhigh, birth control has developed with extraordinary rapidity during\nthe present century. In Holland its principle and practice are freely\ntaught by physicians and nurses to the mothers of the people, with the\nresult that there is in Holland no longer any necessity for unwanted\nbabies, and this small country possesses the proud privilege of the\nlowest death-rate in Europe. In the free and enlightened democratic\ncommunities on the other side of the globe, in Australia and New\nZealand, the same principles and practice are generally accepted, with\nthe same beneficent results. On the other hand, in the more backward\nand ignorant countries of Europe, birth control is still little known,\nand death and disease flourish. This is the case in those eight\ncountries which come at the bottom of both our lists.\n\nEven in the more progressive countries, however, birth control has not\nbeen established without a struggle, which has frequently ended in a\nhypocritical compromise, its principles being publicly ignored or\ndenied and its practice privately accepted. For, at the great and\nvitally important point in human progress which birth control\nrepresents, we really see the conflict of two moralities. The morality\nof the ancient world is here confronted by the morality of the new\nworld. The old morality, knowing nothing of science and the process of\nNature as worked out in the evolution of life, based itself on the\nearly chapters of Genesis, in which the children of Noah are\nrepresented as entering an empty earth which it is their business to\npopulate diligently. So it came about that for this morality, still\ninnocent of eugenics, recklessness was almost a virtue. Children were\ngiven by God; if they died or were afflicted by congenital disease, it\nwas the dispensation of God, and, whatever imprudence the parents might\ncommit, the pathetic faith still ruled that \"God will provide.\" But in\nthe new morality it is realised that in these matters Divine action can\nonly be made manifest in human action, that is to say through the\noperation of our own enlightened reason and resolved will. Prudence,\nforesight, self-restraint--virtues which the old morality looked down\non with benevolent contempt--assume a position of the first importance.\nIn the eyes of the new morality the ideal woman is no longer the meek\ndrudge condemned to endless and often ineffectual child-bearing, but\nthe free and instructed woman, able to look before and after, trained\nin a sense of responsibility alike to herself and to the race, and\ndetermined to have no children but the best. Such were the two\nmoralities which came into conflict during the nineteenth century. They\nwere irreconcilable and each firmly rooted, one in ancient religion and\ntradition, the other in progressive science and reason. Nothing was\npossible in such a clash of opposing ideas but a feeble and confused\ncompromise such as we still find prevailing in various countries of Old\nEurope. It was not a satisfactory solution, however inevitable, and\nespecially unsatisfactory by the consequent obscurantism which placed\ndifficulties in the way of spreading a knowledge of the methods of\nbirth control among the masses of the population. For the result has\nbeen that while the more enlightened and educated have exercised a\ncontrol over the size of their families, the poorer and more\nignorant--who should have been offered every facility and encouragement\nto follow in the same path--have been left, through a conspiracy of\nsecrecy, to carry on helplessly the bad customs of their forefathers.\nThis social neglect has had the result that the superior family stocks\nhave been hampered by the recklessness of the inferior stocks.\n\nWe may see these two moralities in conflict to-day in America. Up till\nrecently America had meekly accepted at Old Europe's hands the\ntraditional prescription of our Mediterranean book of Genesis, with its\nfascinating old-world fragrance of Mount Ararat. On the surface, the\nancient morality had been complacently, almost unquestionably, accepted\nin America, even to the extent of permitting a vast extension of\nabortion--a criminal practice which ever flourishes where birth-control\nis neglected. But to-day we suddenly see a new movement in the United\nStates. In a flash, America has awakened to the true significance of\nthe issue. With that direct vision of hers, that swift practicality of\naction, and, above all, that sense of the democratic nature of all\nsocial progress, we see her resolutely beginning to face this great\nproblem. In her own vigorous native tongue we hear her demanding: \"What\nin the thunder is all the secrecy about, anyhow?\" And we cannot doubt\nthat America's own answer to that demand will be of immense\nsignificance to the whole world.\n\nThus it is that as we get to the root of the matter the whole question\nbecomes clear. We see that there is really no standing ground in any\ncountry for the panic-monger who bemoans the fall of the birth-rate and\nstorms against small families. The falling birth-rate is a world-wide\nphenomenon in all countries that are striving toward a higher\ncivilisation along lines which Nature laid down from the beginning. We\ncannot stop it if we would, and if we could we should merely be\nimpeding civilisation. It is a movement that rights itself and tends to\nreach a just balance. It has not yet reached that balance with us in\nthis country. That may be seen by anyone who has read the letters from\nmothers lately published under the title of _Maternity_ by the Women's\nCo-operative Guild; there is still far more misery caused by having too\nmany babies than by having too few; a bonus on babies would be a\nmisfortune, alike for the parents and the State--whether bestowed at\nbirth as proposed in New Zealand, or at the age of twelve months as\nproposed in France, or fourteen years as proposed in England--unless it\nwere confined to children who were not merely alive at the appointed\nage, but able to pass examination as having reached a definitely high\nstandard. The falling birth-rate, which, it must be remembered, is\naffecting all civilised countries, should be a matter for joy rather\nthan for grief.\n\nBut we need not therefore fold our hands and do nothing. There is still\nmuch to be effected for the protection of Motherhood and the better\ncare of children. We cannot, and should not, attempt to increase the\nnumber of children. But we may well attempt to work for their better\nquality. There we shall be on very safe ground. More knowledge is\nnecessary so that all would-be parents may know how they may best\nbecome parents and how they may, if necessary, best avoid it.\nProcreation by the unfit should be, if not prohibited by law, at all\nevents so discouraged by public opinion that to attempt it would be\ncounted disgraceful. Much greater public provision is necessary for the\ncare of mothers during the months before, as well as during the period\nafter, the child's birth. The system of Schools for Mothers needs to be\nuniversalised and systematically carried out. Along such lines as these\nwe may hope to increase the happiness of the people and the strength of\nthe State. We need not worry over the falling birth-rate.\n\n\n[1] Those who wish to study the latest restatements of opinions in\nEngland may be recommended to read the Report of the Commission of\nInquiry into Great Britain's falling birth-rate, appointed in 1913 by\nthe National Council of Public Morals, under the title of _The\nDeclining Birth-rate: Its Causes and Effects_, 1916.\n\n\n\n\nXVIII\n\n\nBIRTH CONTROL\n\nI.\n\nREPRODUCTION AND THE BIRTH-RATE\n\nThe study of the questions relating to sex, so actively carried on\nduring recent years, has become more and more concentrated on to the\npractical problems of marriage and the family. That was inevitable. It\nis only reasonable that, with our growing scientific knowledge of the\nmysteries of sex, we should seek to apply that knowledge to those\nquestions of life which we must ever regard as central. How can we add\nto the stability or to the flexibility of marriage? How can we most\njudiciously regulate the size of our families?\n\nAt the outset, however, we cannot too deeply impress upon our minds the\nfact that these questions are not new in the world. If we try to find\nan answer to them by confining our attention to the phenomena presented\nby our own species, at our own particular moment of civilisation, it is\nvery likely indeed that we may fall into crude, superficial, even\nmischievous conclusions.\n\nThe fact is that these questions, which are agitating us to-day, have\nagitated the world ever since it has been a world of life at all. The\ndifference is that whereas we seek to deal with them consciously,\nvoluntarily, and deliberately, throughout by far the greater part of\nthe world's life they have been dealt with unconsciously, by methods of\ntrial and error, of perpetual experiment, which has often proved\ncostly, but has all the more clearly brought out the real course of\nnatural progress. We cannot solve problems so ancient and deeply rooted\nas those of sex by merely rational methods which are only of yesterday.\nTo be of value our rational methods must be the revelation in\ndeliberate consciousness of unconscious methods which go far back into\nthe remote past. Our conscious, deliberate, and purposive methods,\ncarried out on the plane of reason, will not be sound unless they are a\ncontinuation of those methods which have already, in the slow evolution\nof life, been found sound and progressive on the plane of instinct.\nThis must be borne in mind by those people--always to be found among\nus, though not always on the side of social advance--who desire their\nown line of conduct in matters of sex to be so closely in accord with\nnatural and Divine law that to question it would be impious.\n\nA medical friend of my own, when once in the dentist's chair under the\ninfluence of nitrous oxide anaesthesia (a condition, as William James\nshowed, which frequently leads us to believe we are solving the\nproblems of the universe), imagined himself facing the Almighty and\ninsistently demanding the real object of the existence of the world.\nAnd the Almighty's answer came in one word: \"Reproduction.\" My friend\nis a man of philosophic mind, and the solution of the mystery of the\nworld's purpose thus presented to him in vision may perhaps serve as a\nsimple and ultimate statement of the object of life. From the very\noutset the great object of Nature to our human eyes seems to be\nprimarily reproduction, in the long run, indeed, an effort after\neconomy of method in the attainment of an ever greater perfection, but\nprimarily reproduction. This tendency to reproduction is indeed so\nfundamental, it is impressed on vital organisation with so great a\nviolence of emphasis, that we may regard the course of evolution as\nmuch more an effort to slow down reproduction than to furnish it with\nany new facilities.\n\nWe must remember that reproduction appears in the history of life before\nsex appears. The lower forms of animal and plant life often reproduce\nthemselves without the aid of sex, and it has even been argued that\nreproduction and sex are directly antagonistic, that active propagation\nis always checked when sexual differentiation is established. \"The\nimpression one gains of sexuality,\" remarks Professor Coulter, foremost\nof American botanists, \"is that it represents reproduction under\npeculiar difficulties.\"[1] Bacteria among primitive plants and protozoa\namong primitive animals are patterns of rapid and prolific reproduction,\nthough sex begins to appear in a rudimentary form in very lowly forms of\nlife, even among the protozoa, and is at first compatible with a high\ndegree of reproduction. A single infusorian becomes in a week the\nancestor of millions, that is to say, of far more individuals than could\nproceed under the most favourable conditions from a pair of elephants in\nfive centuries, while Huxley calculated that the progeny of a single\nparthenogenetic aphis, under favouring circumstances, would in a few\nmonths outweigh the whole population of China.[2] That proviso--\"under\nfavouring conditions\"--is of great importance, for it reveals the weak\npoint in this early method of Nature's for conducting evolution by\nenormously rapid multiplication. Creatures so easily produced could be,\nand were, easily destroyed; no time had been spent on imparting to them\nthe qualities that would enable them to lead, what we should call in our\nown case, long and useful lives.\n\nYet the method of rapid multiplication was not readily or speedily\nabandoned by Nature. Still speaking in our human way, we may say that\nshe tried to give it every chance. Among insects that have advanced so\nfar as the white ants, we find that the queen lays eggs at an enormous\nrate during the whole of her active life, according to some estimates\nat the rate of 80,000 a day. Even in the more primitive members of the\ngreat vertebrate group, to which we ourselves belong, reproduction is\nsometimes still on almost as vast a scale as among lower organisms.\nThus, among herrings, nearly 70,000 eggs have been found in a single\nfemale; but the herring, nevertheless, does not tend to increase in the\nseas, for it is everywhere preyed upon by whales and seals and sharks\nand birds, and, not least, by man. Thus early we see the connection\nbetween a high death-rate and a high birth-rate.\n\nThe evidence against reckless reproduction at last, however, proved\noverwhelming. With whatever hesitation, Nature finally decided, once\nand for all, that it was better, from every point of view, to produce a\nfew superior beings than a vast number of inferior beings. For while\nthe primary end of Nature may be said to be reproduction, there is a\nsecondary end of scarcely less equal urgency, and that is evolution. In\nother words, while Nature seems to our human eyes to be seeking after\nquantity, she is also seeking, and with ever greater eagerness, after\nquality. Now the method of rapid and easy reproduction, it had become\nclear, not only failed of its own end, for the inferior creatures thus\nproduced were unable to maintain their position in life, but it was\ndistinctly unfavourable to any advance in quality. The method of sexual\nreproduction, which had existed in a germinal form more or less from\nthe beginning, asserted itself ever more emphatically, and a method\nlike that of parthenogenesis, or reproduction by the female unaided by\nthe male (illustrated by the aphis), which had lingered on even beside\nsexual reproduction, absolutely died out in higher evolution. Now the\nfertilisation involved by the existence of two sexes is, as Weismann\ninsisted, simply an arrangement which renders possible the\nintermingling of two different hereditary tendencies. The object of\nsex, that is to say, is by no means to aid reproduction, but rather to\nsubordinate and check reproduction in order to evolve higher and more\ncomplex beings. Here we come to the great principle, which Herbert\nSpencer developed at length in his _Principles of Biology_, that, as he\nput it, Individuation and Genesis vary inversely, whence it followed\nthat advancing evolution must be accompanied by declining fertility.\nIndividuation, which means complexity of structure, has advanced, as\nGenesis, the unrestricted tendency to mere multiplication, has receded.\nThis involves a diminished number of offspring, but an increased amount\nof time and care in the creation and breeding of each; it involves also\nthat the reproductive life of the organism is shortened and more or\nless confined to special periods; it begins much later, it usually ends\nearlier, and even in its period of activity it tends to fall into\ncycles. Nature, we see, who, at the outset, had endowed her children so\nlavishly with the aptitude for multiplication, grown wiser now, expends\nher fertile imagination in devising preventive checks on reproduction\nfor her children's use.\n\nThe result is that, though reproduction is greatly slackened, evolution\nis greatly accelerated. The significance of sex, as Coulter puts it,\n\"lies in the fact that it makes organic evolution more rapid and far\nmore varied.\" It is scarcely necessary to emphasise that a highly\nimportant, and, indeed, essential aspect of this greater individuation\nis a higher survival value. The more complex and better equipped\ncreature can meet and subdue difficulties and dangers to which the more\nlowly organised creature that came before--produced wholesale in a way\nwhich Nature seems now to look back on as cheap and nasty--succumbed\nhelplessly without an effort. The idea of economy begins to assert\nitself in the world. It became clear in the course of evolution that it\nis better to produce really good and highly efficient organisms, at\nwhatever cost, than to be content with cheap production on a wholesale\nscale. They allowed greater developmental progress to be made, and they\nlasted better. Even before man began it was proved in the animal world\nthat the death-rate falls as the birth-rate falls.\n\nIf we wish to realise the vast progress in method which has been made,\neven within the limits of the vertebrates to which we ourselves belong,\nwe have but to compare with the lowly herring, already cited, the\nhighly evolved elephant. The herring multiplies with enormous rapidity\nand on a vast scale, and it possesses a very small brain, and is almost\ntotally unequipped to grapple with the special difficulties of its\nlife, to which it succumbs on a wholesale scale. A single elephant is\ncarried for about two years in his mother's womb, and is carefully\nguarded by her for many years after birth; he possesses a large brain;\nhis muscular system is as remarkable for its delicacy as for its power\nand is guided by the most sensitive perceptions. He is fully equipped\nfor all the dangers of his life, save for those which have been\nintroduced by the subtle devilry of modern man, and though a single\npair of elephants produces so few offspring, yet their high cost is\njustified, for each of them has a reasonable chance of surviving to old\nage. The contrast from the point of view of reproduction of the herring\nand the elephant, the low vertebrate and the high vertebrate, well\nillustrates the tendency of evolution. It clearly brings before us the\ndifference between Nature's earlier and later methods, the ever growing\npreference for quality of offspring over quantity.\n\nIt has been necessary to touch on the wider aspects of reproduction in\nNature, even when our main concern is with particular aspects of\nreproduction in man, for unless we understand the progressive tendency\nof reproduction in Nature, we shall probably fail to understand it in\nman. With these preliminary observations, we may now take up the\nquestion as it affects man.\n\nIt is not easy to ascertain the exact tendencies of reproduction in our\nown historical past or among the lower races of to-day. On the whole,\nit seems fairly clear that, under ordinary savage and barbarous\nconditions, rather more children are produced and rather more children\ndie than among ourselves; there is, in other words, a higher birth-rate\nand a higher infantile death-rate.[3] A high birth-rate with a low\ndeath-rate seems to have been even more exceptional than among\nourselves, for under inelastic social conditions the community cannot\nadjust itself to the rapid expansion that would thus be rendered\nnecessary. The community contracts, as it were, on this expanding\nportion and largely crushes it out of life by the forces of neglect,\npoverty, and disease.[4] The only part of Europe in which we can to-day\nsee how this works out on a large scale is Russia, for here we find in\nan exaggerated form conditions, which once tended to rule all over\nEurope, side by side with the beginnings of better things, with\nscientific progress and statistical observation. Yet in Russia, up till\nrecently, if not even still, there has only been about one doctor to\nevery twelve thousand inhabitants, and the witch-doctor has flourished.\nSmall-pox, scarlet fever, diphtheria, typhoid, and syphilis also\nflourish, and not only flourish, but show an enormously higher\nmortality than in other European countries. More significant still,\nfamine and typhus, the special disease of filth and overcrowding and\nmisery--both of them banished, save in the most abnormal times, from\nthe rest of Europe--have in modern times ravaged Russia on a vast\nscale. Ignorance, superstition, insanitation, filth, bad food, impure\nwater, lead to a vast mortality among children which has sometimes\ndestroyed more than half of them before they reach the age of five; so\nthat, enormously high as the Russian birth-rate is, the death-rate has\nsometimes exceeded it.[5] Nor is it found, as some would-be sagacious\npersons confidently assert, that the high birth-rate is justified by\nthe better quality of the survivors. On the contrary, there is a very\nlarge proportion of chronic and incurable diseases among the survivors;\nblindness and other defects abound; and though there are many very\nlarge and fine people in Russia, the average stature of the Russians is\nlower than that of most European peoples.[6]\n\nRussia is in the era of expanding industrialism--a fateful period for\nany people, as we shall see directly--and the results resemble those\nwhich followed, and to some extent exist still, further west. The\nworkers, whose hours often extended to twelve or fourteen, frequently\nhad no homes but slept in the factory itself, in the midst of the\nmachinery, or in a sort of dormitory above it, with a minimum of space\nand fresh air, men and women promiscuously, on wooden shelves, one\nabove the other, under the eye of Government inspectors whose protests\nwere powerless to effect any change. This is, always and everywhere,\neven among so humane a people as the Russians, the natural and\ninevitable result of a high birth-rate in an era of expanding\nindustrialism. Here is the goal of unrestricted reproduction, the same\namong men as among herrings. This is the ideal of those persons,\nwhether they know it or not, who in their criminal rashness would dare\nto arrest that fall in the birth-rate which is now beginning to spread\nits beneficent influence in every civilised land.\n\nWe have no means of ascertaining precisely the birth-rate in Western\nEurope before the nineteenth century, but the estimates of the\npopulation which have been made by the help of various data indicate\nthat the increase during a century was very moderate. In England, for\ninstance, families scarcely seem to have been very large, and, even\napart from wars, many plagues and pestilences, during the eighteenth\ncentury more especially small-pox, constantly devastated the\npopulation, so that, with these checks on the results of reproduction,\nthe population was able to adjust itself to its very gradual expansion.\nThe mortality fell heavily on young children, as we observe in old\nfamily records, where we frequently find two or even three children of\nthe same Christian name, the first child having died and its name been\ngiven to a successor.\n\nDuring the last quarter of the eighteenth century, a new phase of\nsocial life, profoundly affecting the reproductive habits of the\ncommunity, made its appearance in Western Europe, at first in England.\nThis was the new industrial era, due to the introduction of machinery.\nAll the social methods of gradual though awkward adaptation to a slow\nexpansion were dislocated. Easy expansion of population became a\npossibility, for factories were constantly springing up, and \"hands\"\nwere always in demand. Moreover, these \"hands\" could be children for it\nwas possible to tend machinery at a very early age. The richest family\nwas the family with most children. The population began to expand\nrapidly.\n\nIt was an era of prosperity. But when it began to be realised what this\nmeant it was seen that such \"prosperity\" was far from an enviable\ncondition. A community cannot suddenly adjust itself to a sudden\nexpansion, still less can it adjust itself to a continuous rapid\nexpansion. Disease, misery, and poverty flourished in this prosperous\nnew industrial era. Filth and insanitation, immorality and crime, were\nfostered by overcrowding in ill-built urban areas. Ignorance and\nstupidity abounded, for the child, placed in the monotonous routine of\nthe factory when little more than an infant, was deprived alike of the\neducation of the school and of the world. Higher wages brought no\nhigher refinement and were squandered on food and drink, on the lowest\nvulgar tastes. Such \"prosperity\" was merely a brutalising influence; it\nmeant nothing for the growth of civilisation and humanity.\n\nThen a wholesome movement of reaction set in. The betterment of the\nenvironment--that was the great task that social pioneers and reformers\nsaw before them. They courageously set about the herculean task of\ncleansing this Augean stable of \"Prosperity.\" The era of sanitation\nbegan. The endless and highly beneficent course of factory legislature\nwas inaugurated.[7]\n\nThat is the era which, in every progressive country of the world, we\nare living in still. The final tendency of it, however, was not\nforeseen by its great pioneers, or even its humble day-labourers of the\npresent time. For they were not attacking reproduction; they were\nfighting against bad conditions, and may even have thought that they\nwere enabling reproduction to expand more freely. They had not realised\nthat to improve the environment is to check reproduction, being indeed\nthe one and only way in which undue reproduction can be checked. That\nmay be said to be an aspect of the opposition between Genesis and\nIndividuation, on which Herbert Spencer insisted, for by improving the\nenvironment we necessarily improve the individual who is rooted in that\nenvironment. It is not, we must remember, a matter of conscious and\nvoluntary action. That is clearly manifest by the fact that it occurs\neven among the most primitive micro-organisms; when placed under\nunfavourable conditions as to food and environment they tend to pass\ninto a reproductive phase and by sporulation or otherwise begin to\nproduce new individuals rapidly. It is the same in Man. Improve the\nenvironment and reproduction is checked.[8] That is, as Professor\nBenjamin Moore has said, \"the simple biological reply to good economic\nconditions.\" It is only among the poor, the ignorant, and the wretched\nthat reproduction flourishes. \"The tendency of civilisation,\" as\nLeroy-Beaulieu concludes, \"is to reduce the birth-rate.\" Those who\ndesire a high birth-rate are desiring, whether they know it or not, the\nincrease of poverty, ignorance, and wretchedness.\n\nSo far we have been dealing with fundamental laws and tendencies, which\nwere established long before Man appeared on the earth, although Man\nhas often illustrated, and still illustrates, their inevitable\ncharacter. We have not been brought in contact with the influence of\nconscious design and deliberate intention. At this point we reach a\ntotally new aspect of reproduction.\n\n\nII.\n\nTHE ORIGIN AND RESULTS OF BIRTH CONTROL\n\nIn tracing the course of reproduction we have so far been concerned\nwith what are commonly considered the blind operations of Nature in the\nabsence of conscious and deliberate volition. We have seen that while\nat the outset Nature seems to have impressed an immense reproductive\nimpetus on her creatures, all her energy since has been directed to the\nimposition of preventive checks on that reproductive impetus. The end\nattained by these checks has been an extreme diminution in the number\nof offspring, a prolongation of the time devoted to the breeding and\ncare of each new member of the family, in harmony with its greatly\nprolonged life, a spacing out of the intervals between the offspring,\nand, as a result, a vastly greater development of each individual and\nan ever better equipment for the task of living. All this was slowly\nattained automatically, without any conscious volition on the part of\nthe individuals, even when they were human beings, who were the agents.\nNow occurred a change which we may regard as, in some respects, the\nmost momentous sudden advance in the whole history of reproduction: the\nprocess of reproductive progress became conscious and deliberately\nvolitional.\n\nWe often fancy that when natural progress becomes manifested in the\nmind and will of man it is somehow unnatural. It is one of the wisest\nof Shakespeare's utterances in one of the most mature of his plays that\n\n    \"Nature is made better by no mean\n    But Nature makes that mean ...\n              This is an art\n    Which does mend Nature, change it rather, but\n    The art itself is Nature.\"\n\nBirth control, when it ceases to be automatic and becomes conscious, is\nan art. But it is an art directed precisely to the attainment of ends\nwhich Nature has been struggling after for millions of years, and,\nbeing consciously and deliberately an art, it is enabled to avoid many\nof the pitfalls which the unconscious method falls into. It is an art,\nbut\n\n    \"The art itself is Nature.\"\n\nIt is always possible for the narrow-eyed fanatic to object to the\nemployment of birth control, precisely as he might object to the use of\nclothes, as \"unnatural.\" But, if we look more deeply into the matter,\nwe see that even clothes are not truly unnatural. A vast number of\ncreatures may be said to be born in clothes, clothes so naturally such\nthat, when stripped from the animals they belong to, we are proud to\nwear them ourselves. Even our own ancestors were born in clothes, which\nthey lost by the combined or separate action of natural selection,\nsexual selection, and the environment, which action, however, has not\nsufficed to abolish the desirability of clothes.[9] So that the impulse\nby which we make for ourselves clothes is merely a conscious and\nvolitional form of an impulse which, in the absence of consciousness\nand will, had acted automatically. It is just the same with the control\nand limitation of reproductive activity. It is an attempt by open-eyed\nintelligence and foresight to attain those ends which Nature through\nuntold generations has been painfully yet tirelessly struggling for.\nThe deliberate co-operation of Man in the natural task of birth-control\nrepresents an identification of the human will with what we may, if we\nchoose, regard as the divinely appointed law of the world. We can well\nbelieve that the great pioneers who, a century ago, acted in the spirit\nof this faith may have echoed the thought of Kepler when, on discovering\nhis great planetary law, he exclaimed in rapture: \"O God! I think Thy\nthoughts after Thee.\"\n\nAs a matter of fact, however, it was in no such spirit of ecstasy that\nthe pioneers of the movement for birth control acted. The Divine\ncommand is less likely to be heard in the whirlwind than in the still\nsmall voice. These great pioneers were thoughtful, cautious,\nhard-headed men, who spoke scarcely above a whisper, and were far too\nmodest to realise that a great forward movement in natural evolution\nhad in them begun to be manifested. Early man could not have taken this\nstep because it is even doubtful whether he knew that the conjunction\nof the sexes had anything to do with the production of offspring, which\nhe was inclined to attribute to magical causes. Later, although\nintelligence grew, the uncontrolled rule of the sexual impulse obtained\nso firm a grip on men that they laughed at the idea that it was\npossible to exercise forethought and prudence in this sphere; at the\nsame time religion and superstition came into action to preserve the\nestablished tradition and to persuade people that it would be wicked\nto do anything different from what they had always done. But a saner\nfeeling was awakening here and there, in various parts of the world. At\nlast, under the stress of the devastation and misery caused by the\nreproductive relapse of the industrial era, this feeling, voiced by a\nfew distinguished men, began to take shape in action.\n\nThe pioneers were English. Among them Malthus occupies the first place.\nThat distinguished man, in his great and influential work, _The\nPrinciple of Population_, in 1798, emphasised the immense importance of\nforesight and self-control in procreation, and the profound\nsignificance of birth limitation for human welfare. Malthus relied,\nhowever, on ascetic self-restraint, a method which could only appeal to\nthe few; he had nothing to say for the prevention of conception in\nintercourse. That was suggested, twenty years later, very cautiously by\nJames Mill, the father of John Stuart Mill, in the _Encyclopedia\nBritannica_. Four years afterwards, Mill's friend, the Radical\nreformer, Francis Place, advocated this method more clearly. Finally,\nin 1831, Robert Dale Owen, the son of the great Robert Owen, published\nhis _Moral Physiology_, in which he set forth the ways of preventing\nconception; while a little later the Drysdale brothers, ardent and\nunwearying philanthropists, devoted their energies to a propaganda\nwhich has been spreading ever since and has now conquered the whole\ncivilised world.\n\nIt was not, however, in England but in France, so often at the head of\nan advance in civilisation, that birth control first became firmly\nestablished, and that the extravagantly high birth-rate of earlier\ntimes began to fall; this happened in the first half of the nineteenth\ncentury, whether or not it was mainly due to voluntary control.[10] In\nEngland the movement came later, and the steady decline in the English\nbirth-rate, which is still proceeding, began in 1877. In the previous\nyear there had been a famous prosecution of Bradlaugh and Mrs. Besant\nfor disseminating pamphlets describing the methods of preventing\nconception; the charge was described by the Lord Chief Justice, who\ntried the case, as one of the most ill-advised and injudicious ever\nmade in a court of justice. But it served an undesigned end by giving\nenormous publicity to the subject and advertising the methods it sought\nto suppress. There can be no doubt, however, that even apart from this\ntrial the movement would have proceeded on the same lines. The times\nwere ripe, the great industrial expansion had passed its first feverish\nphase, social conditions were improving, education was spreading. The\ninevitable character of the movement is indicated by the fact that at\nthe very same time it began to be manifested all over Europe, indeed in\nevery civilised country of the world. At the present time the\nbirth-rate (as well as usually the death-rate) is falling in every\ncountry of the world sufficiently civilised to possess statistics of\nits own vital movement. The fall varies in rapidity. It has been\nconsiderable in the more progressive countries; it has lingered in the\nmore backward countries. If we examine the latest statistics for Europe\n(usually those for 1913) we find that every country, without exception,\nwith a progressive and educated population, and a fairly high state of\nsocial well-being, presents a birth-rate below 30 per 1,000. We also\nfind that every country in Europe in which the mass of the people are\nprimitive, ignorant, or in a socially unsatisfactory condition (even\nalthough the governing classes may be progressive or ambitious) shows a\nbirth-rate above 30 per 1,000. France, Great Britain, Belgium, Holland,\nthe Scandinavian countries and Switzerland are in the first group.\nRussia, Austro-Hungary, Italy, Spain and the Balkan countries are in\nthe second group. The German Empire was formerly in this second group\nbut now comes within the first group, and has carried on the movement\nso energetically that the birth-rate of Berlin is already below that of\nLondon, and that at the present rate of decline the birth-rate of the\nGerman Empire will before long sink to that of France. Outside Europe,\nin the United States just as much as in Australia and New Zealand, the\nsame great progressive movement is proceeding with equal activity.\n\nThe wide survey of the question of birth limitation here taken may seem\nto some readers unnecessary. Why not get at once to matters of\npractical detail? But, if we think of it, our wide survey has been of\nthe greatest practical help to us. It has, for instance, settled the\nquestion of the desirability of the adoption of methods of preventing\nconception and finally silenced those who would waste our time with\ntheir fears lest it is not right to control conception. We know now on\nwhose side are the laws of God and Nature. We realise that in\nexercising control over the entrance gate of life we are not only\nperforming, consciously and deliberately, a great human duty, but\ncarrying on rationally a beneficial process which has, more blindly and\nwastefully, been carried on since the beginning of the world. There are\nstill a few persons ignorant enough or foolish enough to fight against\nthe advance of civilisation in this matter; we can well afford to leave\nthem severely alone, knowing that in a few years all of them will have\npassed away. It is not our business to defend the control of birth, but\nsimply to discuss how we may most wisely exercise that control.\n\nMany ways of preventing conception have been devised since the method\nwhich is still the commonest was first introduced, so far as our\ncertainly imperfect knowledge extends, by a clever Jew, Onan\n(_Genesis_, Chap. XXXVIII), whose name has since been wrongly attached\nto another practice with which the Mosaic record in no way associates\nhim. There are now many contraceptive methods, some dependent on\nprecautions adopted by the man, others dependent on the woman, others\nagain which take the form of an operation permanently preventing\nconception, and, therefore, not to be adopted save by couples who\nalready have as many children as they desire, or else who ought never\nto have children at all and thus wisely adopt a method of\nsterilisation. It is unnecessary here, even if it were otherwise\ndesirable, to discuss these various methods in detail. It is even\nuseless to do so, for we must bear in mind that no method can be\nabsolutely approved or absolutely condemned. Each may be suitable under\ncertain conditions and for certain couples, and it is not easy to\nrecommend any method indiscriminately. We need to know the intimate\ncircumstances of individual cases. For the most part, experience is the\nfinal test. Forel compared the use of contraceptive devices to the use\nof eyeglasses, and it is obvious that, without expert advice, the\nresults in either case may sometimes be mischievous or at all events\nineffective. Personal advice and instruction are always desirable. In\nHolland nurses are medically trained in a practical knowledge of\ncontraceptive methods, and are thus enabled to enlighten the women of\nthe community. This is an admirable plan. Considering that the use of\ncontraceptive measures is now almost universal, it is astonishing that\nthere are yet so many so-called \"civilised\" countries in which this\nmethod of enlightenment is not everywhere adopted. Until it is adopted,\nand a necessary knowledge of the most fundamental facts of the sexual\nlife brought into every home, the physician must be regarded as the\nproper adviser. It is true that until recently he was generally in\nthese matters a blind leader of the blind. Nowadays it is beginning to\nbe recognised that the physician has no more serious and responsible\nduty than that of giving help in the difficult path of the sexual life.\nVery frequently, indeed, even yet, he has not risen to a sense of his\nresponsibilities in this matter. It is as well to remember, however,\nthat a physician who is unable or unwilling to give frank and sound\nadvice in this most important department of life, is unlikely to be\nreliable in any other department. If he is not up to date here he is\nprobably not up to date anywhere.\n\nWhatever the method adopted, there are certain conditions which it must\nfulfil, even apart from its effectiveness as a contraceptive, in order\nto be satisfactory. Most of these conditions may be summed up in one:\nthe most satisfactory method is that which least interferes with the\nnormal process of the act of intercourse. Every sexual act is, or\nshould be, a miniature courtship, however long marriage may have\nlasted.[11] No outside mental tension or nervous apprehension must be\nallowed to intrude. Any contraceptive proceeding which hastily enters\nthe atmosphere of love immediately before or immediately after the\nmoment of union is unsatisfactory and may be injurious. It even risks\nthe total loss of the contraceptive result, for at such moments the\nintended method may be ineffectively carried out, or neglected\naltogether. No method can be regarded as desirable which interferes\nwith the sense of satisfaction and relief which should follow the\nsupreme act of loving union. No method which produces a nervous jar in\none of the parties, even though it may be satisfactory to the other,\nshould be tolerated. Such considerations must for some couples rule out\ncertain methods. We cannot, however, lay down absolute rules, because\nmethods which some couples may find satisfactory prove unsatisfactory\nin other cases. Experience, aided by expert advice, is the only final\ncriterion.\n\nWhen a contraceptive method is adopted under satisfactory conditions,\nwith a due regard to the requirements of the individual couple, there\nis little room to fear that any injurious results will be occasioned.\nIt is quite true that many physicians speak emphatically concerning the\ninjurious results to husband or to wife of contraceptive devices.\nAlthough there has been exaggeration, and prejudice has often been\nimported into this question, and although most of the injurious results\ncould have been avoided had trained medical help been at hand to advise\nbetter methods, there can be no doubt that much that has been said\nunder this head is true. Considering how widespread is the use of these\nmethods, and how ignorantly they have often been carried out, it would\nbe surprising indeed if it were not true. But even supposing that the\nnervously injurious effects which have been traced to contraceptive\npractices were a thousandfold greater than they have been reported to\nbe--instead of, as we are justified in believing, considerably less\nthan they are reported--shall we therefore condemn contraceptive\nmethods? To do so would be to ignore all the vastly greater evils which\nhave followed in the past from unchecked reproduction. It would be a\ncondemnation which, if we exercised it consistently, would destroy the\nwhole of civilisation and place us back in savagery. For what device of\nman, since man had any history at all, has not proved sometimes\ninjurious?\n\nEvery one of even the most useful and beneficent of human inventions\nhas either exercised subtle injuries or produced appalling\ncatastrophes. This is not only true of man's devices, it is true of\nNature's in general. Let us take, for instance, the elevation of man's\nancestors from the quadrupedal to the bipedal position. The experiment\nof making a series of four-footed animals walk on their hind-legs was\nvery revolutionary and risky; it was far, far more beset by dangers\nthan is the introduction of contraceptives; we are still suffering all\nsorts of serious evils in consequence of Nature's action in placing our\nremote ancestors in the erect position. Yet we feel that it was worth\nwhile; even those physicians who most emphasise the evil results of the\nerect position do not advise that we should go on all-fours. It is just\nthe same with a great human device, the introduction of clothes. They\nhave led to all sorts of new susceptibilities to disease and even\ntendencies to direct injury of many kinds. Yet no one advocates the\ncomplete disuse of all clothing on the ground that corsets have\nsometimes proved harmful. It would be just as absurd to advocate the\ncomplete abandonment of contraceptives on the ground that some of them\nhave sometimes been misused. If it were not, indeed, that we are\nfamiliar with the lengths to which ignorance and prejudice may go we\nshould question the sanity of anyone who put forward so foolish a\nproposition. Every great step which Nature and man have taken in the\npath of progress has been beset by dangers which are gladly risked\nbecause of the advantages involved. We have still to enumerate some of\nthe immense advantages which Man has gained in acquiring a conscious\nand deliberate control of reproduction.\n\n\nIII.\n\nBIRTH CONTROL IN RELATION TO MORALITY AND EUGENICS\n\nAnyone who has followed this discussion so far will not easily believe\nthat a tendency so deeply rooted in Nature as Birth Control can ever be\nin opposition to Morality. It can only seem to be so when we confuse\nthe eternal principles of Morality, whatever they may be, with their\ntemporary applications, which are always becoming modified in\nadaptation to changing circumstances.\n\nWe are often in danger of doing injustice to the morality of the past,\nand it is important, even in order to understand the morality of the\npresent, that we should be able to put ourselves in the place of those\nfor whom birth control was immoral. To speak of birth control as having\nbeen immoral in the past is, indeed, to underestimate the case; it was\nnot only immoral, it was unnatural, it was even irreligious, it was\nalmost criminal. We must remember that throughout the Christian world\nthe Divine Command, \"Increase and Multiply,\" has seemed to echo down\nthe ages from the beginning of the world. It was the authoritative\ncommand of a tribal God who was, according to the scriptural narrative,\naddressing a world inhabited by eight people. From such a point of view\na world's population of several thousand persons would have seemed\ninconceivably vast, though to-day by even the most austere advocate of\nbirth limitation it would be allowed with a smile. But the old\nreligious command has become a tradition which has survived amid\nconditions totally unlike those under which it arose. In comparatively\nmodern times it has been reinforced from unexpected quarters, on the\none hand by all the forces that are opposed to democracy and on the\nother by all the forces of would-be patriotic militarism, both alike\nclamouring for plentiful and cheap men.\n\nEven science, under primitive conditions, was opposed to Birth Control.\nCreation was regarded as a direct process in which man's will had no\npart, and knowledge of nature was still too imperfect for the\nrecognition of the fact that the whole course of the world's natural\nhistory has been an erection of barriers against wholesale and\nindiscriminate reproduction. Thus it came about that under the old\ndispensation, which is now for ever passing away, to have as many\nchildren as possible and to have them as often as possible--provided\ncertain ritual prescriptions were fulfilled--seemed to be a religious,\nmoral, natural, scientific, and patriotic duty.\n\nTo-day the conditions have altogether altered, and even our own\nfeelings have altered. We no longer feel with the ancient Hebrew who\nhas bequeathed his ideals though not his practices to Christendom, that\nto have as many wives and concubines and as large a family as possible\nis both natural and virtuous, as well as profitable. We realise,\nmoreover, that the Divine Commands, so far as we recognise any such\ncommands, are not external to us, but are manifested in our own\ndeliberate reason and will. We know that to primitive men, who lacked\nforesight and lived mainly in the present, only that Divine Command\ncould be recognisable which sanctified the impulse of the moment, while\nto us, who live largely in the future, and have learnt foresight, the\nDivine Command involves restraint on the impulse of the moment. We no\nlonger believe that we are divinely ordered to be reckless or that God\ncommands us to have children who, as we ourselves know, are fatally\ncondemned to disease or premature death. Providence, which was once\nregarded as the attribute of God, we regard as the attribute of men;\nprovidence, prudence, self-restraint--these are to us the\ncharacteristics of moral men, and those persons who lack these\ncharacteristics are condemned by our social order to be reckoned among\nthe dregs of mankind. It is a social order which in the sphere of\nprocreation could not be reached or maintained except by the systematic\ncontrol of offspring.\n\nWe may realise the difference between the morality of to-day and the\nmorality of the past when we come to details. We may consider, for\ninstance, the question of the chastity of women. According to the ideas\nof the old morality, which placed the whole question of procreation\nunder the authority (after God) of men, women were in subjection to\nmen, and had no right to freedom, no right to responsibility, no right\nto knowledge, for, it was believed, if entrusted with any of these they\nwould abuse them at once. That view prevails even to-day in some\ncivilised countries, and middle-class Italian parents, for instance,\nwill not allow their daughter to be conducted by a man even to Mass,\nfor they believe that as soon as she is out of their sight she will be\nunchaste. That is their morality. Our morality to-day, however, is\ninspired by different ideas, and aims at a different practice. We are\nby no means disposed to rate highly the morality of a girl who is only\nchaste so long as she is under her parents' eyes; for us, indeed, that\nis much more like immorality than morality. We are to-day vigorously\npursuing a totally different line of action. We wish women to be\nreasonably free, we wish them to be trained in the sense of\nresponsibility for their own actions, we wish them to possess\nknowledge, more especially in that sphere of sex, once theoretically\nclosed to them, which we now recognise as peculiarly their own domain.\nNowadays, moreover, we are sufficiently well acquainted with human\nnature to know, not only that at best the \"chastity\" merely due to\ncompulsion or to ignorance is a poor thing, but that at worst it is\nreally the most degraded and injurious form of unchastity. For there\nare many ways of avoiding pregnancy besides the use of contraceptives,\nand such ways can often only be called vicious, destructive to purity,\nand harmful to health. Our ideal woman to-day is not she who is\ndeprived of freedom and knowledge in the cloister, even though only the\ncloister of her home, but the woman who, being instructed from early\nlife in the facts of sexual physiology and sexual hygiene, is also\ntrained in the exercise of freedom and self-responsibility, and able to\nbe trusted to choose and to follow the path which seems to her right.\nThat is the only kind of morality which seems to us real and worth\nwhile. And, in any case, we have now grown wise enough to know that no\ndegree of compulsion and no depth of ignorance will suffice to make a\ngirl good if she doesn't want to be good. So that, even as a matter of\npolicy, it is better to put her in a position to know what is good and\nto act in accordance with that knowledge.\n\nThe relation of birth control to morality is, however, by no means a\nquestion which concerns women alone. It equally concerns men. Here we\nhave to recognise, not only that the exercise of control over\nprocreation enables a man to form a union of faithful devotion with the\nwoman of his choice at an earlier age than would otherwise be possible,\nbut it further enables him, throughout the whole of married life, to\ncontinue such relationship under circumstances which might otherwise\nrender them injurious or else undesirable to his wife. That the\ninfluence thus exerted by preventive methods would suffice to abolish\nprostitution it would be foolish to maintain, for prostitution has\nother grounds of support. But even within the sphere of merely\nprostitutional relationships the use of contraceptives, and the\nprecautions and cleanliness they involve, have an influence of their\nown in diminishing the risks of venereal disease, and while the\ninterests of those who engage in prostitution are by some persons\nregarded as negligible, we must always remember that venereal disease\nspreads far beyond the patrons of prostitution and is a perpetual\nmenace to others who may become altogether innocent victims. So that\nany influence which tends to diminish venereal disease increases the\nwell-being of the whole community.\n\nApart from the relationship to morality, although the two are\nintimately combined, we are thus led to the relationship of birth\ncontrol to eugenics, or to the sound breeding of the race. Here we\ntouch the highest ground, and are concerned with our best hopes for the\nfuture of the world. For there can be no doubt that birth control is\nnot only a precious but an indispensable instrument in moulding the\ncoming man to the measure of our developing ideals. Without it we are\npowerless in the face of the awful evils which flow from random and\nreckless reproduction. With it we possess a power so great that some\npersons have professed to see in it a menace to the propagation of the\nrace, amusing themselves with the idea that if people possess the means\nto prevent the conception of children they will never have children at\nall. It is not necessary to discuss such a grotesque notion seriously.\nThe desire for children is far too deeply implanted in mankind and\nwomankind alike ever to be rooted out. If there are to-day many parents\nwhose lives are rendered wretched by large families and the miseries of\nexcessive child-bearing, there are an equal number whose lives are\nwretched because they have no children at all, and who snatch eagerly\nat any straw which offers the smallest promise of relief to this\ncraving. Certainly there are people who desire marriage, but--some for\nvery sound and estimable reasons and others for reasons which may less\nwell bear examination--do not desire any children at all. So far as\nthese are concerned, contraceptive methods, far from being a social\nevil, are a social blessing. For nothing is so certain as that it is an\nunmixed evil for a community to possess unwilling, undesirable, or\nincompetent parents. Birth control would be an unmixed blessing if it\nmerely enabled us to exclude such persons from the ranks of parenthood.\nWe desire no parents who are not both competent and willing parents.\nOnly such parents are fit to father and to mother a future race worthy\nto rule the world.\n\nIt is sometimes said that the control of conception, since it is\nfrequently carried out immediately on marriage, will tend to delay\nparenthood until an unduly late age. Birth control has, however, no\nnecessary result of this kind, and might even act in the reverse\ndirection. A chief cause of delay in marriage is the prospect of the\nburden and expense of an unrestricted flow of children into the family,\nand in Great Britain, since 1911, with the extension of the use of\ncontraceptives, there has been a slight but regular increase not only\nin the general marriage rate but in the proportion of early marriages,\nalthough the _general_ mean age at marriage has increased. The ability\nto control the number of children not only enables marriage to take\nplace at an early age but also makes it possible for the couple to have\nat least one child soon after marriage. The total number of children\nare thus spaced out, instead of following in rapid succession.\n\nIt is only of recent years that the eugenic importance of a\nconsiderable interval between births has been fully recognised, as\nregards not only the mother--this has long been realised--but also the\nchildren. The very high mortality of large families has long been\nknown, and their association with degenerate conditions and with\ncriminality. The children of small families in Toronto, Canada, are\ntaller than those of larger families, as is also the case in Oakland,\nCalifornia, where the average size of the family is smaller than in\nToronto.[12] Of recent years, moreover, evidence has been obtained that\nfamilies in which the children are separated from each other by\nintervals of more than two years are both mentally and physically\nsuperior to those in which the interval is shorter. Thus Ewart found in\na northern English manufacturing town that children born at an interval\nof less than two years after the birth of the previous child remain\nnotably defective, even at the age of six, both as regards intelligence\nand physical development. When compared with children born at a longer\ninterval and with first-born children, they are, on the average, three\ninches shorter and three pounds lighter than first-born children.[13]\nSuch observations need to be repeated in various countries, but if\nconfirmed it is obvious that they represent a fact of the most vital\nsignificance.\n\nThus when we calmly survey, in however summary a manner, the great\nfield of life affected by the establishment of voluntary human control\nover the production of the race, we can see no cause for anything but\nhope. It is satisfactory that it should be so, for there can be no\ndoubt that we are here facing a great and permanent fact in civilised\nlife. With every rise in civilisation, indeed with all evolutionary\nprogress whatever, there is what seems to be an automatic fall in the\nbirth-rate. That fall is always normally accompanied by a fall in the\ndeath-rate, so that a low birth-rate frequently means a high rate of\nnatural increase, since most of the children born survive.[14] Thus in\nthe civilised world of to-day, notwithstanding the low birth-rate which\nprevails as compared with earlier times, the rate of increase in the\npopulation is still, as Leroy-Beaulieu points out, appalling, nearly\nhalf a million a year in Great Britain, over half a million in\nAustro-Hungary, and three-quarters of a million in Germany. When we\nexamine this excess of births in detail we find among them a large\nproportion of undesired and undesirable children. There are two opposed\nalternative methods working to diminish this proportion: the method of\npreventing conception, with which we have here been concerned, and the\nmethod of preventing live birth by producing abortion. There can be no\ndoubt about the enormous extension of this latter practice in all\ncivilised countries, even although some of the estimates of its\nfrequency in the United States, where it seems especially to flourish,\nmay be extravagant. The burden of excessive children on the overworked\nunderfed mothers of the working classes becomes at last so intolerable\nthat anything seems better than another child. \"I'd rather swallow the\ndruggist's shop and the man in it than have another kid,\" as, Miss\nElderton reports, a woman in Yorkshire said.[15]\n\nNow there has of late years arisen a movement, especially among German\nwomen, for bringing abortion into honour and repute, so that it may be\ncarried out openly and with the aid of the best physicians. This\nmovement has been supported by lawyers and social reformers of high\nposition. It may be admitted that women have an abstract right to\nabortion and that in exceptional cases that right should be exerted.\nYet there can be very little doubt to most people that abortion is a\nwasteful, injurious, and almost degrading method of dealing with the\nbirth-rate, a feeble apology for recklessness and improvidence. A\nsociety in which abortion flourishes cannot be regarded as a healthy\nsociety. Therefore, a community which takes upon itself to encourage\nabortion is incurring a heavy responsibility. I am referring more\nespecially to the United States, where this condition of things is most\nmarked. For, there cannot be any doubt about it, just as all those who\nwork for birth control are diminishing the frequency of abortion, so\n_every attempt to discourage birth control promotes abortion_. We have\nto approach this problem calmly, in the light of Nature and reason. We\nhave each of us to decide on which side we shall range ourselves. For\nit is a vital social problem concerning which we cannot afford to be\nindifferent.\n\nThere is here no desire to exaggerate the importance of birth control.\nIt is not a royal road to the millennium, and, as I have already\npointed out, like all other measures which the course of progress\nforces us to adopt, it has its disadvantages. Yet at the present moment\nits real and vital significance is acutely brought home to us.\n\nFlinders Petrie, discussing those great migrations due to the\nunrestricted expansion of barbarous races which have devastated Europe\nfrom the dawn of history, remarks: \"We deal lightly and coldly with the\nabstract facts, but they represent the most terrible tragedies of all\nhumanity--the wreck of the whole system of civilisation, protracted\nstarvation, wholesale massacre. Can it be avoided? That is the\nquestion, before all others, to the statesman who looks beyond the\npresent time.\"[16] Since Petrie wrote, only ten years ago, we have had\noccasion to realise that the vast expansions which he described are not\nconfined to the remote past, but are at work and producing the same\nawful results, even at the very present hour. The great and only\nlegitimate apology which has been put forward for the aggressive\nattitude of Germany in the present war has been that it was the\ninevitable expansive outcome of the abnormally high birth-rate of\nGermany in recent times; as Dr. Dernburg, not long ago, put it: \"The\nexpansion of the German nation has been so extraordinary during the\nlast twenty-five years that the conditions existing before the war had\nbecome insupportable.\" In other words, there was no outlet but a\ndevastating war. So we are called upon to repeat, with fresh emphasis,\nPetrie's question: _Can it be avoided_? All humanity, all civilisation,\ncall upon us to take up our stand on this vital question of birth\ncontrol. In so doing we shall each of us be contributing, however\nhumbly, to\n\n              \"one far-off divine event,\n    To which the whole creation moves.\"\n\n\n[1] J.M. Coulter, _The Evolution of Sex in Plants_, 1915; Geoffrey\nSmith, \"The Biology of Sex,\" _Eugenics Review_, April, 1914.\n\n[2] See, _e.g._, Geddes and Thomson, _The Evolution of Sex_, Ch. XX.;\nand T.H. Morgan, _Heredity and Sex_, Ch. I.\n\n[3] To quote one of the most careful investigators of this point,\nNorthcote Thomas, among the Edo-speaking people of Nigeria, found\nthat the average number of living children per husband was 2.7;\nincluding all children, alive and dead, the average number was per\nhusband 4.5, and per wife 2.7. \"Infant mortality is heavy\" (Northcote\nThomas, _Anthropological Report of Edo-speaking People of Nigeria_,\n1910, Part I., pp. 15, 63).\n\n[4] The same end has been rather more mercifully achieved in earlier\nperiods by infanticide (see Westermarck, _Origin and Development of the\nMoral Ideas_, Vol. I., Ch. 17). It must not be supposed that infanticide\nwas opposed to tenderness to children. Thus the Australian Dieyerie,\nwho practised infanticide, were kind to children, and a mother found\nbeating her child was herself beaten by her husband.\n\n[5] See Havelock Ellis, _The Nationalisation of Health_.\n\n[6] Similar results appear to follow in China where also the birth-rate\nis very high and the mortality very great. It is stated that physical\ndevelopment is much inferior and pathological defects more numerous\namong Chinese as compared with American students. (_New York Medical\nJournal_, Nov. 14th, 1914, p. 978.) The bad conditions which produce\ndeath in the weakest produce deterioration in the survivors.\n\n[7] The law is thus laid down by P. Leroy-Beaulieu (_La Question de la\nPopulation_, 1913, p. 233): \"The first degree of prosperity in a rude\npopulation with few needs develops prolificness; a later degree of\nprosperity, accompanied by all the feelings and ideas stimulated by\nthe development of education and a democratic environment, leads to\na gradual reduction of prolificness.\"\n\n[8] This is too often forgotten. Birth control is a natural process,\nand though in civilised men, endowed with high intelligence, it\nnecessarily works in some measure voluntarily and deliberately, it is\nprobable that it still also works, as in the evolution of the lower\nanimals, to some extent automatically. Sir Shirley Murphy (_Lancet_,\nAug. 10th, 1912), while admitting that intentional restriction has\nbeen operative, remarks: \"It does not appear to me that there is any\nmore reason for ignoring the likelihood that Nature has been largely\nconcerned in the reduction of births than for ignoring the effects of\nNature in reducing the death-rate. The decline in both has points of\nresemblance. Both have been widely manifest over Europe, both have in\nthe main declined in the period of 1871-1880, and indeed both appear\nto be behaving in like manner.\"\n\n[9] I do not overlook the fact that the artificial clothing of primitive\nman is in its origin mainly ornament, having myself insisted on that\nfact in discussing this point in \"The Evolution of Modesty\" (_Studies\nin the Psychology of Sex_, Vol. I.). It is to be remembered that, in\nanimals--and very conspicuously, for instance, in birds--natural\nclothing is also largely ornament of secondary sexual significance.\n\n[10] At the end of the eighteenth century there were in France four\nchildren on the average to a family; a movement of rapid increase\nin the population reached its climax in 1846; by 1860 the average\nnumber of children to a family had slowly fallen to but little over\nthree. Broca, writing in 1867 (\"Sur la Pretendue Degenerescence de la\nPopulation Francaise\"), mentioned that the slow fall in the birth-rate\nwas only slightly due to prudent calculation and mainly to more general\ncauses such as delay in marriage.\n\n[11] Havelock Ellis, _Studies in the Psychology of Sex_, Vol. VI., \"Sex\nin Relation to Society,\" Ch. XI., The Art of Love.\n\n[12] The exact results are presented by F. Boas (abstract of Report on\n_Changes in Bodily Form of Descendants of Immigrants_, Washington, 1911,\np. 57), who concludes that \"the physical development of children, as\nmeasured by stature, is the better the smaller the family.\"\n\n[13] R.J. Ewart, \"The Influence of Parental Age on Offspring,\" _Eugenics\nReview_, Oct., 1911.\n\n[14] In New Zealand the birth-rate is very low; but the death-rate of\nchildren in the first year is only 58 per thousand as against 130 in\nEngland.\n\n[15] E.M. Elderton, _Report on the English Birth-rate_, Part I.,\n1914. See also the collection of narratives of their experiences by\nworking-class mothers, published under the title of _Maternity_\n(Women's Co-operative Guild, 1915).\n\n[16] Flinders Petrie, _Journal of the Anthropological Institute_,\n1906, p. 220.","title":"Essays in War-Time: Further Studies in the Task of Social Hygiene","tradition":"philosophy-ethics","translated_text":null,"word_count":61787}