[135] Études sur la sélection chez l’homme. Paris, 1904.
[136] England and the English.
[137] Notably by Prof. Flinders Petrie in his Revolutions of Civilisation.
[138] Op. cit. p. 407.
[139] De Laponge does not stand alone in this opinion. Many biologists and leaders of thought have expressed it hardly less strongly, though not all of them have attached so much importance to the influence of the towns. It has been expressed in general terms by Dr and Mrs Whetham (in the Hibbert Journal for Oct. 1911), by Dean Inge in a number of forcible articles, by Mr W. Bateson in his ‘Herbert Spencer Lecture’ for 1912, and by other writers in a number of articles in the Eugenics Review and other journals.
[140] This conclusion may perhaps be said to be now generally accepted by those who have given any thought to the matter. A. R. Wallace argued strongly in this sense; the late Benjamin Kidd set out the evidence impressively in his Social Evolution, Chapter IX; and it is implied by all the many writers who, as we have noted, agree in regarding the processes of selection in the civilised nations as in the main reversed or detrimental.
[141] I refer the reader to my Social Psychology.
[142] In this connection I may again refer to The Pagan Tribes of Borneo, by C. Hose and W. McDougall.
[143] It has been translated into nine languages and was reprinted ten times in the first year after its publication.
[144] Shortly before his death Mr Kidd published (in the year 1918) his Science of Power. In this book he showed a complete change of face on the question of the importance of innate qualities. He denied all importance to changes of innate qualities, whether for better or worse, because, as he maintained, “the social heredity transmitted through social culture is infinitely more important to a people than any heredity inborn in the individuals thereof” (p. 273); and he made in this book a violent and scornful attack upon the late Francis Galton and upon all who follow him in believing that the decay or improvement of the racial qualities of a people are of importance for its prosperity and development, and who, therefore, approve of Galton’s effort to found a science of Eugenics. Kidd did not anywhere in his last book acknowledge that he had made this very great change of principle, which completely undermines the whole argument of his Social Evolution, but complacently suggested that, as Newton and Darwin are regarded as the fathers of modern physical and biological science respectively, so in the future Kidd will be regarded as having founded anew in his Social Evolution the science of society. On reading the Science of Power after having written this chapter, I was amazed at this assumption on behalf of a book whose most fundamental doctrine the author had himself renounced, and I turned again to the earlier work to verify my brief summary of its argument. I confess that it is not easy to make sure of what the author was driving at. But I find that Kidd, in discussing the influence of religious systems, wrote (on p. 307) “Natural selection seems, in short, to be steadily evolving in the race that type of character upon which these forces act most readily and efficiently; that is to say, it is evolving religious character in the first instance, and intellectual character only as a secondary product in association with it.” On the following page I find—“The race would, in fact, appear to be growing more and more religious,” and “a preponderating element in the type of character which the evolutionary forces at work in human society are slowly developing, would appear to be the sense of reverence.” And there are many other passages which, in spite of the habitual lack of precision of Kidd’s language, can only be interpreted to mean that the improvement of moral or religious character, on which he so strongly insists as a feature of recent centuries, involves and depends upon improvement of innate qualities in the mass of the people.
[145] Otto Seeck (op. cit. vol. 1. p. 270) writes—“The equipment of the legionaries remained unchanged from Augustus to Diocletian: no improvements of tactics, no new munitions of war were brought into use during more than three hundred years. The Roman saw his enemies becoming ever more terrible, his own army ever less efficient; for now this, now that, Province was laid waste and all were threatened. It was, therefore, to the most urgent interest of every citizen that this state of affairs should be remedied; the most cultured circles were familiar with the needs of the army, for all the higher officers came from the class of Senators and nobles. Nevertheless, there appeared not a single invention, which might have assured to the Roman soldiers their erstwhile superiority! Books indeed were written upon tactics, strategy and fortification, but their authors almost without exception were content to expound in a formal manner what their more capable forefathers had taught; in this literature the expression of any new idea was carefully avoided.... As in the military sphere, so also was it in all others. Neither in agriculture, nor in handicrafts, nor in the practice of statecraft, did a new idea of any importance appear since the first century after Christ. Literature and art also moved only in sterile imitation, which became always more poverty-stricken and technically feebler.”
[146] Cf. La Cité Antique of F. de Coulanges.
[147] A fact which provides another argument against use-inheritance.
[148] This was written before the Great War but needs, I think, no modification.
[149] Francis Galton and his disciples have produced much evidence to show that the educated class of Englishmen includes a very much larger proportion of strains of high ability than the rest of the people, it having been formed by the long continued operation of the social ladder. There is no reason to doubt the truth of this conclusion.
[150] Prof. S. Alexander, in his Moral Order and Progress, was perhaps the first to draw attention to this form of the struggle for existence.
[151] This last sentence perhaps is only partially true. A rigid system of State Socialism would involve a retrogression in this respect.
[152] As the Spaniards well-nigh exterminated in the name of the Church the civilisation and the nations of Mexico and Peru.
[153] Introduction to Social Psychology.
[154] Heredity and Selection in Sociology, London, 1907; an interesting work similar in tendency to Kidd’s Social Evolution.
The progress of Psychology during the last half century has been both rapid and extensive. Along the lines of theoretical inquiry significant and far-reaching results have been attained; the methods of experimental research have been successfully applied to a wide range of mental phenomena; and it is now generally recognised that in connexion with the subject-matter of many branches of scientific pursuit psychological problems of fundamental importance present themselves for solution. The object of the Cambridge Psychological Library is to furnish a series of books, written by men actually engaged in the work of research, dealing with the various subjects that come within the field of Psychology. The extent of this field may be gauged from the titles of the volumes given below, some of which have already appeared, the others being in preparation.
For the reasons indicated, the Cambridge Psychological Library will appeal not only to Psychologists but also to students of many other departments of scientific thought and investigation, such as Philosophy, Sociology, Art, Comparative Religion, Anthropology, Physiology, Zoology, Medicine, Education and Industrial Efficiency.
The following volumes have been arranged:
| Psychological Principles. | |
| By Prof. James Ward, Sc.D., F.B.A. | |
| Royal 8vo. 2nd edition. 24s. net. | [Now ready |
| An Introduction to the Study of Colour Vision. | |
| By J. Herbert Parsons, D.Sc., F.R.C.S. | |
| Royal 8vo. Frontispiece and 75 text-figures. 12s 6d | [Now ready |
| The Group Mind. | |
| By W. Mcdougall, F.R.S. | |
| Royal 8vo. | [Now ready |
| Prolegomena to Psychology. | |
| By Prof. G. Dawes Hicks, M.A., Ph.D., Litt.D. | |
| Psychology in Relation to Theory of Knowledge. | |
| By Prof. G. F. Stout, M.A., LL.D., F.B.A. | |
| The Nervous System. | |
| By Prof. C. S. Sherrington, M.D., F.R.S. | |
| The Structure of the Nervous System and the Sense Organs. | |
| By Prof. G. Elliot Smith, M.D., F.R.S. | |
| Mental Measurement. | |
| By W. Brown, D.Sc. and G. H. Thomson, D.Sc., Ph.D. | [In the Press |
| The Psychology of Mental Differences. | |
| By C. Burt, M.A. | |
| The Psychology of Personality and Suggestion. | |
| By T. W. Mitchell, M.D. | |
| The Psychology of Dreams. | |
| By Prof. T. H. Pear, M.A. | |
| Comparative Psychology. | |
| By Prof. Carveth Read, M.A. | |
| The Process of Conventionalisation. | |
| By F. C. Bartlett, M.A. |