s its scope and intent are concerned. This is not to be
wondered at, for the subject has not been presented to the ordinary reader
in a form that would tend to encourage inquiry or honest investigation. The
critic and the wit have deliberately misinterpreted its principles, and
have almost succeeded in masking its supreme function in the garb of folly.

The writer has yet to meet a conscientious mother who fails to evince a
reasonable degree of enthusiastic interest in eugenics when properly
informed of its fundamental principles.

The eugenic ideal is a worthy race--a race of men and women physically and
mentally capable of self-support. The eugenist, therefore, demands that
every child born shall be a worthy child--a child born of healthy, selected
parents.

No one can successfully assail the ethics of this appeal. It is morally a
just contention to strive for a healthy race. It is also an economic
necessity as we shall see.

The history of the world informs us that there have been many civilizations
which, in some respects, equalled our own. These races of people have all
achieved a certain success, and have then passed entirely out of existence.
Why? _And are we destined to extinction in the same way?_ We know that the
cause of the decline and ultimate extinction of all past civilizations was
due primarily to the moral decadence of their people. Disease and vice
gradually sapped their vitality, and their continuance was impossible. [xx]
It would seem to be the destiny of a race to achieve material prosperity at
the expense of its morality. When conditions render possible the fulfilment
of every human desire, the race exhausts its vitality in a surfeitment of
caprice. The animal instincts predominate, and the potential vigor of the
people is exhausted in contributing to its own amusement. Each succeeding
civilization has reached this epochal period, and has fallen, victim of the
rapacity of stronger and younger invading antagonists, _themselves to
succumb to the same insidious process_.

The present civilization has reached this epochal--this transition--period.
In one hundred years from now we shall either have accomplished what no
previous civilization accomplished, or we shall have ceased to exist as a
race. Our success depends on the response of the people to the eugenic
appeal. Few appreciate the responsibility involved.

It is not necessary, however, to combat or deplore the evils of the past.
Civilization