[46] In a lecture, “The Obstacles to Eugenics,” delivered before the Sociological Society, March 8, 1909.
[47] Since these words were written there has been passed the “Prevention of Crimes Act,” which is the first attempt in this country to apply the elementary truths of the subject in legislation. As an essentially eugenic proposal it is to be heartily welcomed.
[48] Dr. Bulstrode's Lecture to the Royal Institution, May 15, 1908.
[49] This suggestion, first made by the present writer in March, 1908, and in the paper referred to on p. 205, is, I believe, to be the subject of an official enquiry.
[50] Sociological Papers (Macmillan, 1905), p. 3.
[51] “In any scheme of eugenics, energy is the most important quality to favour; it is, as we have seen, the basis of every action, and it is eminently transmissible by descent.”—Galton.
[52] Fortnightly Review, January, 1908.
[53] “As the German philosopher Schopenhauer remarks, the final aim of all love intrigues, be they comic or tragic, is really of more importance than all other ends in human life. What it all turns upon is nothing less than the composition of the next generation.... It is not the weal or woe of any one individual, but that of the human race to come, which is at stake.”—Darwin, Descent of Man, p. 893.
[54] Studies in the Psychology of Sex, vol. iv. (F. A. Davis Co., Philadelphia, 1905).
[55] Part of the matter of this chapter was included in papers entitled “Racial Hygiene or Negative Eugenics, with special reference to the Extirpation of Alcoholism,” read before the Congress of the Royal Institute of Public Health, at Buxton, 1908, and “Alcoholism and Eugenics,” read before the Society for the Study of Inebriety, April, 1909.