the eighteenth century is a phenomenon quite unique in history, and
never likely to be repeated.[16] It was rendered possible by the new
labour-saving inventions which immensely increased the exports which
could be exchanged for food, and by the opening up of vast new
food-producing areas. The chief method by which the increase was
effected, especially in the later period, has been the lengthening of
human life by improved sanitation and medical science.[17] Since 1865
the average duration of life in England and Wales has been raised by a
little more than one-third. Other European countries show the same ratio
of improvement. This astonishing result, so little known and so seldom
referred to, was bound to have a great effect on the birth-rate. So long
as the swarming period continued at its height, a net annual increase of
15 or even 20 per thousand could be sustained; but the expansion of the
European peoples has now passed its zenith, and a tendency to revert to
more normal conditions is almost everywhere observable. One of the most
advanced nations, France, has already reached the equilibrium towards
which other civilised nations are moving. The old-established families
in the United States are believed to be actually dwindling.
The student of international vital statistics will be struck first by
the very wide differences in the birth-rate of different countries. He
will then notice that the more backward countries have on the whole a
considerably higher birth-rate than the more advanced. Thirdly, he will
observe the parallelism between the birth-rate and death-rate, which
makes the net increase in countries with a high birth-rate very little
larger than that of countries with a low birth-rate. The following
figures will illustrate these points; they are taken from the
Registrar-General's Blue Book for 1912.
Birth-rate Death-rate Net rate of
increase
United Kingdom 23.9 13.8 10.1
Australia 28.7 11.2 17.5
Austria 31.3 20.5 10.8
Belgium 22.9 16.4 6.5
France 19.0 17.5 1.5
Germany 28.6 17.3 11.3
Italy 32.4 18.2 14.2
New Zealand 26.5 8.9 17.6
Norway 25.4 13.4 12.0
Roumania 43.4 22.9 20.5
Russia 44.0 28.9 15.1
It will be seen that Australia and New Zealand, with low birth-rates and
the lowest death-rates in the world increase more rapidly than Russia
with an enormous birth-rate and proportionately high death-rate. No one
can doubt that our colonies achieve their increase with far less
friction and misery than the prolific but short-lived Slavs.
Civilisation in a high form is incompatible with such conditions as
these figures disclose in Russia. The figures for Egypt and India are
similar to the Russian, but in India, which is overfull, the mortality
is greater than even in Russia, and the same is true of China, in which
we are told that seven out of ten children die in infancy. It has been
suggested that the fairest measure of a country's well-being, as regards
its actual vitality, is the square of the death-rate divided by the
birth-rate.
It is well known that a decline in the birth-rate set in about forty
years ago in this country, and has gone on steadily ever since, till the
fall now amounts to about one-third of the total births. It thus
corresponds very nearly to the fall in the death-rate during the same
period. It is also well known that this decline is not evenly
distributed among different classes of the people. Until the decline
began, large families were the rule in all classes, and the slightly
larger families of the poor were compensated by their somewhat higher
mortality. But since 1877 large families have become increasingly rare
in the upper and middle classes, and among the skilled artisans. They
are frequent in the thriftless ranks of unskilled labour, and in one
section of well-paid workmen--the miners. The highest birth-rates at
present are in the mining districts and in the slums. The lowest are in
some of the learned professions. In the Rhondda Valley the birth-rate is
still about forty, which is double the rate in the prosperous
residential suburbs of London. In the seats of the textile industry the
decline has been very severe, although wages are fairly good; among the
agricultural labourers the rate is also low. It will be found that in
all trades where the women work for wages the birth-rate has fallen
sharply; the miner's wife does not earn money, and has therefore less
inducement to restrict her family. In agricultural districts the housing
difficulty is mainly responsible; in the upper and middle classes the
heavy expense of education and the burden of rates and taxes are
probably the main reasons why larger families are not desired. We may
add that in almost all the professions old men are overpaid and young
men under-paid. Mr. and Mrs. Whetham[18] have found that, before 1870,
143 marriages of men whose names appear in 'Who's Who' resulted in 743
children, an average of 5.2 each; after 1870 the average is only 3.08.
Celibacy also is commoner among the educated. 'From the reports issued
by two Women's Colleges, it appears that, excluding those who have left
college within three years or less, out of 3000 women only 22 per cent.
have married, and the number of children born to each marriage is
undoubtedly very small.' The writers consider that this state of things
is extremely dangerous for the country, inasmuch as we are now breeding
mainly from our worst stocks (the feeble-minded are very prolific),
while our best families are stationary or dwindling. Without denying the
general truth of this pessimistic conclusion,[19] it may be pointed out
that the miners are, physically at least, above the average of the whole
population, and that the very low birth-rate of residential districts is
partly due to the presence in large numbers of unmarried domestic
servants. The death-rate of the slums is also very high.
The fears of the eugenist about the quality of the population are far
more reasonable than the invectives of the fanatic about its defective
quantity. Of the latter class we may say with Havelock Ellis that 'those
who seek to restore the birth-rate of half a century ago are engaged in
a task which would be criminal if it were not based on ignorance, and
which is in any case fatuous.' And yet I hope to show before the close
of this article that for two or three generations the British Empire
could absorb a considerable increase, and that the Government might with
advantage stimulate this by schemes of colonisation. The lament of the
eugenist resounds in all countries alike. The German complains that the
Poles, whom he considers an inferior race, breed like rabbits, while the
gifted exponents of _Kultur_ only breed like hares. The American is
nervous about the numbers of the negro; he has more reason to be nervous
about the fecundity of the Slav and South Italian immigrant. Everywhere
the tendency is for the superior stock to dwindle till it becomes a
small aristocracy. The Americans of British descent are threatened with
this fate. Pride and a high standard of living are not biological
virtues. The man who needs and spends little is the ultimate inheritor
of the earth. I know of no instance in history in which a ruling race
has not ultimately been ousted or absorbed by its subjects. Complete
extermination or expropriation is the only successful method of
conquest. The Anglo-Saxon race has thus established itself in the
greater part of Britain, and in Australasia. In North America it has
destroyed the Indian hunter, who could not be used for industrial
purposes; but the temptation to exploit the negro and the cheaper
European races was too strong to be resisted, and Nature's heaviest
penalty is now being exacted against the descendants of our sturdy
colonists. We did not lose America in the eighteenth century; we are
losing it now. As for South Africa, the Kaffir can live like a gentleman
(according to his own ideas) on six months' ill-paid work every year;
the Englishman finds an income of £200 too small. There is only one end
to this kind of colonisation. The danger at home is that the larger part
of the population is now beginning to insist upon a scale of
remuneration and a standard of comfort which are incompatible with any
survival-value. We all wish to be privileged aristocrats, with no serfs
to work for us. Dame Nature cares nothing for the babble of politicians
and trade-union regulations. She says to us what Plotinus, in a
remarkable passage, makes her say: 'You should not ask questions; you
should try to understand. _I am not in the habit of talking._' In
Nature's school it is a word and a blow, and the blow first. Before the
close of this article I will return to the eugenic problem, and will
consider whether anything can be done to solve it.
At the present time, when an apparently internecine conflict is raging
between the British Empire and Germany, a more detailed comparison of
the vital statistics of the two countries will be read with interest. In
England and Wales the birth-rate culminated in 1876 at a little over 36,
after slowly rising from 33 in 1850. From 1876 the line of decline is
almost straight, down to the ante-war figure of about 24. In Prussia,
owing partly to wars, the fluctuations have been violent. In 1850 the
figure (omitting decimals) was 39; in 1855, 34; in 1859, 40; in 1871,
34; in 1875, nearly 41. From this date, as in England, the steady
decline began. In 1907 the rate had fallen to 33; in 1913 (German
Empire) to 27.5. Here we may notice the abnormally high rate in the
years following the great war of 1870, a phenomenon which was marked
also throughout Europe after the Napoleonic wars. We may also notice
that the decline has been of late slightly more rapid in Germany,
falling from a high birth-rate, than in England, where the maximum was
never so high. Another fact which comes out when the German figures are
more carefully examined is that urbanisation in Germany has a
sterilising effect which is not operative in England. Prinzing gives the
comparative figures of _legitimate_ fertility for Prussia as follows:
1879-1882 1894-1897
Berlin 23.8 16.9[20]
Other great towns 26.7 23.5
Towns of 20,000 to 100,000 26.8 25.7
Small towns 27.8 25.9
Country districts 28.8 29.0
Now urbanisation is going on even more rapidly in Germany than in
England. The death-rate in England and Wales rose from 21 in 1850 to
23.5 in 1854; after sharp fluctuations it reached 23.7 in 1864; since
then it has declined to its present figure (in normal times) of 14. In
Prussia after the war of 1870 and the small-pox epidemic of 1871, there
has been a steady fall from 26 to 17.3 (German Empire in 1911). The net
increase is only slightly larger (in proportion to the population) in
Germany than in England; and the increase in our great colonies,
especially in Australasia, is much higher than in Germany. There is
therefore no reason to suppose that a rapid alteration is going on to
our disadvantage.
It is widely believed that the Roman Catholic Church, by sternly
forbidding the artificial limitation of families, is increasing its
numbers at the expense of the non-Catholic populations. To some extent
this is true. The Prussian figures for 1895-1900 give the number of
children per marriage as:
Both parents Catholic 5
Both parents Protestant 4
Both parents Jews 3.7
An examination of the entries in 'Who's Who' gives about the same
proportion for well-to-do families in England. The Catholic birth-rate
of the Irish is nearly 40.[21] The French-Canadians are among the most
prolific races in the world. On the other hand, their infant mortality
is very high, and it is said that French-Canadian parents take these
losses philosophically. It is quite a different question whether it is
ultimately to the advantage of a nation which desires to increase its
numbers to profess the Roman Catholic religion. The high birth-rates are
all in unprogressive Catholic populations. When a Catholic people begins
to be educated, the priests apparently lose their influence upon the
habits of the laity, and a rapid decline in the births at once sets in.
The most advanced countries which did not accept the Reformation, France
and Belgium, are precisely those in which parental prudence has been
carried almost to excess. We must also remember that the Dutch Boers,
who are Protestants, but who live under simple conditions not unlike
those of the French-Canadians, are equally prolific, as were our own
colonists in the United States before that country was industrialised.
The advantages in numbers gained by Roman Catholicism are likely to be
confined to half-empty countries, where there is really room for more
citizens, and where social ambition and the love of comfort are the
chief motives for restricting the family.
The population of a settled country cannot be increased at will; it
depends on the supply of food. The choice is between a high birth-rate
combined with a high death-rate, and a low birth-rate with a low
death-rate. The great saving of life which has been effected during the
last fifty years carries with it the necessity of restricting the
births. The next question to be considered is how this restriction is to
be brought about. The oldest methods are deliberate neglect and
infanticide. In China, where authorities differ as to the extent to
which female infants are exposed, the practice certainly prevails of
feeding infants whom their mothers are unable to suckle on rice and
water, which soon terminates their existence. Such methods would happily
find no advocates in Europe. The very ancient art of procuring
miscarriage is a criminal act in most civilised countries, but it is
practised to an appalling extent. Hirsch, who quotes his authorities,
estimates that 2,000,000 births are so prevented annually in the United
States, 400,000 in Germany, 50,000 in Paris, and 19,000 in Lyons. In our
own country it is exceedingly common in the northern towns, and attempts
are now being made to prohibit the sale of certain preparations of lead
which are used for this purpose. Alike on grounds of public health and
of morality, it is most desirable that this mischievous practice should
be checked. Its great prevalence in the United States is to be
attributed mainly to the drastic legislation in that country against the
sale and use of preventives, to which many persons take objection on
moral or æsthetic grounds, but which is surely on an entirely different
level from the destruction of life that has already begun. The
'Comstock' legislation in America has done unmixed harm. It is worse
than useless to try to put down by law a practice which a very large
number of people believes to be innocent, and which must be left to the
taste and conscience of the individual. To the present writer it seems a
_pis aller_ which high-minded married persons should avoid if they can
practise self-restraint. Whatever injures the feeling of
'sanctification and honour' with which St. Paul bids us to regard these
intimacies of life, whatever tends to profane or degrade the sacraments
of wedded love, is so far an evil. But this is emphatically a matter in
which every man and woman must judge for themselves, and must refrain
from judging others.
In every modern civilised country population is restricted partly by the
deliberate postponement of marriage. In many cases this does no harm
whatever; but in many others it gravely diminishes the happiness of
young people, and may even cause minor disturbances of health. Moreover,
it would not be so widely adopted but for the tolerance, on the part of
society, of the 'great social evil,' the opprobrium of our civilisation.
In spite of the failure hitherto of priests, moralists, and legislators
to root it out, and in spite of the acceptance of it as inevitable by
the majority of Continental opinion, I believe that this abomination
will not long be tolerated by the conscience of the free and progressive
nations. It is notorious that the whole body of women deeply resents the
wrong and contumely done by it to their sex, and that, if democracy is
to be a reality, the immolation of a considerable section of women drawn
from the poorer classes cannot be suffered to continue. It is also plain
to all who have examined the subject that the campaign against certain
diseases, the malignity and wide diffusion of which are being more fully
realised every year, cannot be successful through medical methods alone.
If the institution in question were abolished, medical science would
soon reduce these scourges to manageable limits, and might at last
exterminate them altogether; but while it continues there is no hope of
doing this. I believe then that the time will come when the trade in
vice will cease; and if I am right, early marriages will become the rule
in all classes. This will render the population question more acute,
especially as the diseases which we hope to extirpate are the commonest
cause both of sterility and of infant mortality. Under this pressure, we
must expect to see preventive methods widely accepted as the least of
unavoidable evils.
When we reflect on the whole problem in its widest aspects, we see that
civilised humanity is confronted by a Choice of Hercules. On the one
side, biological law seems to urge us forward to the struggle for
existence and expansion. The nation in that case will have to be
organised on the lines of greatest efficiency. A strong centralised
government will occupy itself largely in preventing waste. All the
resources of the nation must be used to the uttermost. Parks must be cut
up into allotments; the unproductive labours of the scholar and thinker
must be jealously controlled and limited. Inefficient citizens must be
weeded out; wages must be low and hours of work long. Moreover, the
State must be organised for war; for its neighbours, we must suppose,
are following the same policy. Then the fierce extra-group competition
must come to its logical arbitrament in a life and death struggle. And
war between two over-peopled countries, for both of which more
elbow-room is a vital necessity, must be a war of complete expropriation
or extermination. It must be so, for no other kind of war can achieve
its object. The horrors of the present conflict will be as nothing
compared with a struggle between two highly-organised State socialisms,
each of which knows that it must either colonise the territory of the
other or starve. It is idle to pretend that such a necessity will never
arise. Another century of increase in Europe like that of the nineteenth
century would bring it very near. If this policy is adopted, we shall
see all the principal States organising themselves with a perfection far
greater than that of Germany to-day, but taking German methods as their
model; and the end will be the extermination of the smaller or looser
organisations. Such a prospect may well fill us with horror; and it is
terrible to find some of the ablest thinkers of Germany, such as Ernst
Troeltsch, writing calm elegies over 'the death of Liberalism' and
predicting the advent of an era of cut-throat international competition.
Juvenal speaks of the folly of _propter vitam vivendi perdere causas_;
and who would care to live in such a world? But does Nature care whether
we enjoy our lives or not?
The other choice is that which France has made for herself; it is on the
lines of Plato's ideal State. Each country is to be, as far as
possible, self-sufficing. If it cannot grow sufficient food for itself,
it must of course export its coal or its gold, or the products of its
industry and ingenuity. But it must know approximately what 'the number
of the State' (as Plato said) should be. It must limit its population to
that number, and the limit will be fixed, not at the maximum number who
can live there anyhow, but at the maximum number who can 'live well.'
The object aimed at will not be constant expansion, but well-being. The
energies liberated from the pitiless struggle for existence will be
devoted to making social life wiser, happier, more harmonious and more
beautiful. Have we any reason to hope that this policy is not contrary
to the hard laws which Nature imposes on every species in the world?
In the first place, would such a State escape being devoured by some
brutal 'expanding' neighbour? What would have happened to France if she
had stood alone in this war? The danger is real; but we may answer that
France, as a matter of fact, did not stand alone, because other nations
thought her too precious to be sacrificed. And the completely organised
competitive State which I have imagined would be a far more unlovely
place than Germany, and more unpleasant to live in. The spectacle of a
saner and happier polity next door would break up the purely competitive
State from within; the strain would be too great for human nature. We
cannot argue confidently from the struggle for existence among the lower
animals to our own species. For a long time past, human evolution has
been directed, not to living anyhow, but to living in a certain way. We
are guided by ideals for the future, by purposes winch we clearly set
before ourselves, in a way which is impossible to the brutes. These
purposes are common to the large majority of men. No State can long
maintain a rigid and oppressive organisation, except under the threat of
danger; and a nation which aims only at perfecting its own culture is
not dangerous to its neighbours. It is probable that without the
supposed menace of another military Power on its eastern flank German
militarism would have begun to crumble.
In the second place, would the absence of sharp competition within the
group lead to racial degeneration? This is a difficult question to
answer. Perhaps a diminution of pugnacity and of the means to gratify
this instinct would not be a misfortune. But it is certainly true that,
if the operation of natural selection is suspended, rational selection
must take its place. Failing this, reversion to a lower type is
inevitable. The infant science of eugenics will have much to say on this
subject hereafter; at present we are only discovering how complex and
obscure the laws of heredity are. The State of the future will have to
step in to prevent the propagation of undesirable variations, whether
physical or mental, and will doubtless find means to encourage the
increase of families that are well endowed by Nature.
Assuming that a nation as a whole prefers a policy of this kind, and
aims at such an equilibrium of births and deaths as will set free the
energies of the people for the higher objects of civilised life, how
will it escape the cacogenic effects of family restriction in the better
classes combined with reckless multiplication among the refuse which
always exists in a large community? This is a problem which has not yet
been solved. Public opinion is not ready for legislation against the
multiplication of the unfit, and it is not easy to see what form such
legislation could take. Many of the very poor are not undesirable
parents; we must not confound economic prosperity with biological
fitness. The 'submerged tenth' should be raised, where it is possible,
into a condition of self-respect and responsibility; but they must not
be allowed to be a burden upon the efficient; and the upper and middle
classes should simplify their habits so far as to make marriage and
parenthood possible for the young professional man. Special care should
be taken that taxation is so adjusted as not to penalise parenthood in
the socially valuable middle class.