exists in Chicago, New Orleans, St. Louis, and
other large cities, I have every reason to believe.

There are yet other evidences of degeneration; witness the eroticism
that is to be found in our literature. Unless a book appeals to the
degenerate tastes of its readers it might just as well never have been
published. This is not cynicism; it is plain, unvarnished truth. Again,
turn to the stage, and we find the same thing. The tragedies and
comedies of Shakespeare are shelved, while immoral "society plays" and
"living pictures" and "problem plays" hold the boards. Salacity, with
only sufficient and that is, degeneration. That which happened centuries
ago will happen again, for covering to hide downright lewdness, is
everywhere apparent. Now what is the result of this? There can be but
one answer, man is governed by the same laws of nature now as he was
then.

Statistics show that insanity is markedly on the increase. This is not
to be wondered at when we take into consideration the fact that
debauchery is the rule, and not the exception, among certain classes of
people. Syphilis, one of the most productive causes of degeneration, is
exceedingly active throughout the whole civilized world. Blashko states
that one out of every ten men in the city of Berlin is tainted with this
terrible malady. This is wholly attributable to the unbounded sensuality
of the people. Crime of every description is rearing its hydra-head, and
clasping in its destroying embrace an alarming proportion of human
beings.

I have shown elsewhere, that the congenital criminal is the result of
degeneration, and that he comes from all classes of society. He is,
however, most frequently the product of the lower classes, and lives
and dies among his congeners. I have shown, also, that the anarchist,
the nihilist, and the socialist belong to the same category of
degenerate beings. Poverty, brought on by high taxation, by war, and by
overcrowding, has been, during the last millenary period, very fertile
in the production of degenerates in the Old World. Lack of food and
sanitation, the usual adjuncts of poverty, are powerful factors in the
production of degenerate individuals. The Old World has gotten rid of
these people as rapidly as possible by unloading them on our shores.
Year after year, practically without restriction, thousands of these
anti-social men and women have swarmed into our country, until we,
comparatively speaking, a nation just born,