There remains unaccounted for—what? All the life and experiences of a rich young man.
What were his parents like? Did his mother nurse him, or neglect him? Did his father watch over him, or let him run wild? Were his companions all men and women of virtue and good sense? Did he read no bad books? Did he make no dangerous friendships? Did he ever do any work? Was he ever taught that there art nobler ways of life than shooting dumb animals, seducing vain or helpless girls, debauching at bachelors' parties, playing at bridge, reading French novels, and running loose in the gilded hells of Europe and America?
Because, until we have these and a few thousand other questions answered, we cannot accept Mr. Chesterton's assurance that this wicked nobleman had a good environment.
Then, as to that question of "original sin." Is Mr. Chesterton in a position to inform us that his bold bad peer is not a degenerate? Is Mr. Chesterton sure that he has not inherited a degenerate nature from diseased or vicious ancestors?
No insanity in the family? No gout? No consumption? No drunkenness? No diseases contracted through immorality or vice? All his family for a hundred generations back certified as having united "the manners of a marquis and the morals of a Methodist"?
Quite sure the noble was not a degenerate? Quite sure that his failure was not due to bad environment instead of to bad heredity?
Then I should advise Mr. Chesterton to study Darwin, Galton, Lombroso, Weissmann, and Dr. Lydston, and he will find that a man of good descent may cast back, or "breed back," to the ape or hog, may be born an atavist; and may be incapable of being a gentleman for the simple reason that he is a wild beast.
In which connection I may remark that in The Diseases of Society Dr. Lydston mentions that Benedikt's experiments upon criminal skulls showed that the skull of "the born criminal" (atavist) "approximates that of the carnivora." That is to say, a man may be cursed with a skull resembling that of a tiger.
Is it any wonder that such men, to repeat Mr. Chesterton's poetical simile, "put forth sins like scarlet flowers in summer"?
I am grateful to Mr. Campbell and to Mr. Chesterton for their arguments: they serve the useful purpose of exemplifying the confusion of thought upon this subject which exists in quarters where we should least expect to find it.