The important question which now arises is, To which of these two conditions is the retrogression of the people of England due? Is it due to a morbid inheritance, germinal, and therefore transmissible; or is it caused by a faulty environment, non-germinal and non-transmissible? From what has been said it is plain that the method of treatment will entirely depend upon the answer which is given.

Let us first of all consider the environment. It is unfortunately a fact that of late years there has been a growing tendency towards the lessening of parental responsibility; and this, together with other causes, has led to a relaxation of parental discipline and a considerable alteration in the domestic environment of the rising generation. I think it is probable that these changes have not been without adverse effect upon the character and ideals of many present-day members of the community. But, if the care and responsibility of the parent has declined, the same cannot be said of the State. On the contrary, for many years past the State has evinced an increasing sense of responsibility for its citizens; and the fostering care which it now bestows upon them is greater than at any former period.

The modern development of this State supervision dates from the passing of the various Public Health Acts in the seventies of the last century; and it is important to grasp the enormous improvements which have been effected in the environment of the nation since that time. A full account of these is here impossible, but it may be said that they include such matters as the disposal of sewage, removal of house and trade refuse, repair of highways, control of nuisances, maintenance of open spaces, public lighting, removal of unhealthy dwellings and clearing away of slums, town-planning, erection of houses for the working classes, regulation of the hours and conditions of work in factories and workshops, particularly of females, inspection and prohibition of certain dangerous trades, reduction of licenses for the sale of intoxicants, inspection of food and drugs and of bakehouses, dairies and slaughter-houses, the notification and isolation of infectious diseases, the provision of hospitals and of a poor-law medical service, the appointment of sanitary and other inspectors, of

district and school nurses, of municipal milk-depots, and the like.

In short, for forty years the most determined efforts have been made by the State, by private philanthropists and social reformers, by men of science and physicians, to improve the environment of the people of this country. And these efforts have not been in vain. I do not suggest that the environment is perfect, it is far from that; but at no time has more attention been bestowed upon the welfare of the mass of the people from their birth to the grave than at present; and there cannot be the slightest doubt that, in regard to the hours and conditions of their work, the sanitation of their dwellings, the air they breathe, the food they eat, the education they receive, and the medical and surgical treatment at their command, they are vastly better off than at any time since the great industrial development of a hundred years ago. Further, the economic conditions are also better. During the last few years, it is true, there has been a rise in the cost of living; but, with the exception of this, the price of food has steadily declined, and there has been a general, and in many cases a very considerable, increase in the rate of wages. Unemployment occurs in periodical waves, and of these there have been several during recent years; but they have not been greater or more prolonged than at former periods. In every way, therefore, the environment of the nation has been improved.

And yet, as we have seen, with all these advantages the people of England are showing undoubted indications of a failure to adapt themselves to the requirements of progress. They are more prone to illness and mental breakdown; and the number of the dependent and parasitic class is increasing. The following extract from the Report of the Poor-Law Commissioners (1909, p. 52) is so apposite as to be worth quoting.

'It is very unpleasant to record that, notwithstanding our assumed moral and material progress, and notwithstanding the enormous annual expenditure, amounting to nearly sixty millions a year, upon poor relief, education and public health, we still have a vast army of persons quartered upon us unable to support themselves, and an army which in numbers has recently shown signs of increase rather than decrease.'

To whatever causes the condition is due, I think it is

plain that it cannot be the immediate environment. The Local Government Board have recently published an important blue-book entitled Public Health and Social Conditions,' which describes very fully the great improvements which have been effected in the surroundings of the people of England during the past fifty years. There could be no more damning proof of the absolute failure of such measures to remedy these grave defects, and therefore of the fact that they are due to something much more deeply seated than the environment.

Let us now consider the other factor-heredity. The manner in which the threatened degeneracy of the country is chiefly showing itself is in the increasing number of its dependent class; and this class is largely composed of the mentally unsound and the socially incompetent. The mentally unsound class comprises lunatics, idiots, imbeciles, and the feeble-minded as well as those of low mental resistance. There is now not the slightest doubt that the cause of these conditions lies in a morbid inheritance. With regard to the feeble-minded group, I have shown that, while about 10 per cent. may owe their condition to some accident or external cause, the remaining 90 per cent. are the product of a markedly degenerate stock which contains amongst its members feeble-minded, insane, epileptics, alcoholics, consumptives, criminals, paupers and other social failures. The same, to a somewhat less extent, is true of the insane. cases of insanity are undoubtedly due to an adverse environment; but all those who have studied the matter are now agreed that the chief cause lies in a morbid inheritance; that, like the feeble-minded, the majority of the insane are the descendants of a neuropathic stock. There is a blight upon the germ-cell; and the whole science of medicine affords no more striking instance of the transmissibility of disease than in the case of the insane and mentally defective.

Some

Social incapacity is largely manifested as pauperism; and here again there is clear evidence that in the great majority of instances the cause lies, not in the surroundings, but in an inherent weakness of will and moral fibre, in an innate defect of character, whereby the individual inevitably takes the line of least resistance. The same is true of the vast majority of the habitual

criminal class. In these cases also recent enquiries have demonstrated that the defect is a germinal one; it is inherited and transmissible; and many family histories have now been published showing that both pauperism and criminality pass from generation to generation. In fact, many of these degenerate stocks contain examples of all types of physical, mental and civic unfitness. There are, in fact, two distinct classes in the community. On the one hand, there are those of sound, unimpaired constitution and vitality who are on the 'up-grade' and who are adapting themselves to the demands of the time -the biologically fit. On the other hand, there are those springing from germ-plasm which is so impaired that this adaptation is impossible, who are on the 'down-grade' and falling out in the march of civilisation-the biologically unfit.

Taken in connexion with this fundamental fact, a study of the birth-rate fully explains the retrogression of the nation. As is well known, there has been a continuous decline. In the year 1876 the birth-rate of England and Wales stood at 35 per 1000 population; since then it has steadily fallen until in 1911 it was only 24.4. It has been argued that a diminishing birth-rate may not be a disadvantage. It has been contended that, if the fewer children being born are receiving greater care, and if this means a greater possibility of development, the result may actually be a national advantage; in other words, that the question is not so much one of the quantity as of the quality of the children born. Without subscribing to the statement that quantity is of no significance, we may fully admit the importance of quality. It becomes necessary, therefore, to ascertain what kind of children are being produced. Has the decline in the birth-rate been incident upon all classes of the community equally, or has it affected some and not others? There is the clearest evidence that not only has the decline been a differential one, but that it has been in the wrong direction.

In the first place, it is not only apparent from official statistics, but it has been specially shown by Mr David Heron and Mr and Mrs Whetham that the decline has been chiefly marked in the most capable, most cultured and most intellectual classes. Mr Heron, as the result of

a very thorough investigation into twenty-seven districts of London, concludes that the wives in the districts of least prosperity and culture have the largest families, and the morally and socially lowest classes in the community are those which are reproducing themselves with the greatest rapidity.' It is possible that, for many years at any rate, some discrepancy of this kind has existed, but 'the causes which lead the poorer stocks of the community to reproduce at a greater rate than the better stocks have increased in effect by nearly 100 per cent. during the last fifty years.' Mr Whetham, working by a totally different method, arrives at the same general conclusion. He has shown emphatically that, not only among the highest classes of society but among the most capable members of the learned professions and of the official and commercial classes, there has been a marked and serious decline in the number of births. Mr Sidney Webb has arrived at a similar conclusion from an analysis of the lying-in claims paid to members of the Hearts of Oak Benefit Society. This society is the largest of its kind in the kingdom, and is composed of industrious, thrifty and healthy artisans. It may, in fact, be considered as representing the cream of the artisan class. The society provides a 'lying-in' benefit of 30s. for each confinement of a member's wife. From the year 1866 to 1880 there was a slight increase in the ratio of lying-in claims to the number of members; but since 1880 it has steadily declined. Mr Webb says:†

'The birth-rate among the population of a million and a quarter persons, distinguished from the rest, so far as is known, only by one common characteristic, that of thrift, has fallen off between 1881 and 1901 by no less than 46 per cent.; or a decline nearly three times as great as that during the same period in England and Wales. Taking the whole period of decline, from 1880 down to the latest year for which I have the statistics, 1904, the falling off is over 52 per cent.'

Again, some ten years ago I drew attention to the fact that while the average number of children in a family throughout the whole population was 4.63, the average

On the Relation of Fertility in Man to Social Status' (Drapers' Company Research Memoirs, pp. 15, 19).

The Decline in the Birth Rate' (Fabian Tracts, No. 131, p. 7).