THE HUMAN INSTINCT.

King Country Chronicle, Volume VI, Issue 502, 21 September 1912, Page 3

THE HUMAN INSTINCT.

INTERESTING SPEECHES AT EUGENIC CONGRESS.

At the Eugenic Congress in London recently, Professor Samuel G. Smith, of Minnesota University, gave an address on '"Eugenics and the New Social Consciousness." He declared that one of the futilities of practical discussion was the supposition on the part of some people that if marriage were made difficult for the unfit the race would be improved. It should be remembered that whenever marriage was made difficult immorality increased, and that maternity and marriages were by no means synonymous. So lonp; as women loved strength and men loved beauty, and mating was upon terms of preference the human instinct did not go far wrong. Referring to the ravages of disease among the human race, Professor Smith said: "If I were to choose my own father I would rather have a robust burglar than a consumptive bishop." Society on the whole, he continued, suffered more from the vices of the rich than the vices of the poor They might say they would not permit the poor to breed, but how could they deal with those who defied society by the conventions of wealth, social position and power? He was of opinion that modern science had taken its inspirations too largely from biology. It was time to have done with the practice of regarding man as simply the highest of the mammals whose breed could be improved by the methods of the stock farm. What the world owed to invalids would provide material for one of the most remarkable treaties ever written. He was not sure that for intellectual efficiency some little abnormality of the flesh was not almost a pre-requisite. Dr Ploetz, President of the International Society for Race Hygiene, Germany, said it could be admitted that every possible child should be nourished and educated, but not that every child possible should be born (Hear, hear)

Professor Smith, in replying, referred to the phrase "criminal born," and said in England they knew what to do with these people. They sent them to America to become founders of the first Virgianian families, or to Australia and New Zealand, where they became Prime Ministers. (Laughter). Speaking on "Practical Eugenics in Education," Professor F. C. S. Shiller, of Oxford University, remarked that professionally a "blue" was a greater asset than a "first" for a schoolmaster, a lawyer, a business man, or even a clergyman. No longer would a Dean of Ghristchurch follow Gainsford in advising ambitious youth to practise the writing of Greek verses as "an elegant accomplishment which not infrequently leads to posts of considerable emoluments in the Church." The athletic system thoroughly suited the British character and recognised the ideal of fitness, which had great eugenic value. It ought not to be impossible to convince the British boy that he ought to aim at all-round fitness —skill in using the brain as well as in using the mus^cle.

Dr Murray Leslie paid a tribute to the Boy Scout movement, in which, he said, the highset ideals were being inculcated into boys, and in which good ideals regarding sex problems were being taught. The movement augured well for the future of the coming generation. Professor Kellogg, Stanford Muir, California, in a paper on "Eugenics and Militarism." declared that the Army was the breeding ground of the most terrible disease known. He believed that it might be shown that the direct selection for war purposes of the most sturdy individuals in the community was thoroughly disadvantageous to the race.

General on Bardel, Germany, was emphatic in his assertion that the military life was healthy. Col. Melville, speaking from the military surgeon's point of view, said that there was less disease in the German army than in the German population. The effect of militarism was to prevent disease when militarism was properly understood. It protected young men and taught them discipline. Col. Warden said that our army used to be taken from the worst specimens from the eugenist's point of view. To-day, however, the standard was very high. Ths country desired quality, and not quantity. Although there was a lot of disease in the army, it was steadily decreasing, Professor Achillie Loria.. Turin, in a paper upon the "Psycho-physical Elite and the Economic Elite," emphasised the necessity of defining the particular sphere in which eugenists shoulud opeate to develop a more perfect humanity, and declared that while it might certainly be said that some of those who obtained the highest incomes were equipped with superior mental capacity, it was also possible that the large majority were composed of degenerates, and that no section of them excluded that class. The history of great fortunes went to show that most often great patrimonies were created, not so much by superior genius as by shameful and iniquitous practices. If however, founders of great fortunes should by chance be gifted with superior capacity, it was certain that their descendants would be wanting in it, because the law of "return to the mean" would apply. As a matter uf fact it was marriages of class and caste that furnished the most deplorable results. It was requisite to proceed to a minute and positive examination of characters, which must be directly ascertained, and not inferred from the fantastic criterion of their economic position, and it was necessary to take care, by means of wise institutions, that marriages might take place exclusively among the most select class, physically and mentally.