the jurisdiction of the natural law.

When religious schisms swayed the world, the stronger party, in material
strength or in actual numbers, massacred the weaker, which was frequently
the fitter from the standpoint of desirability as progenitors of the race.
Thus posterity was deprived of what probably was the representative,
potential strength of generations.

At a later date religious schism changed her _modus operandi_ but
accomplished the same pernicious purpose, as the following shows:

"Whenever a man or woman was possessed of a gentle nature that fitted him
or her to deeds of charity, to meditation, to literature or to art, the
social condition of the time was such that they had no refuge elsewhere
than in the bosom of the Church. But the Church chose to preach and exact
celibacy, and the consequence was that these gentle natures had no
continuance, and thus, by a policy, was brutalized the breed of our
forefathers."

When religion was not the dominating power, mankind was ruled by militant
tyrants. The non-elect were slaves,--uneducated, uncivilized, debased and
diseased. The elect were licentious and indolent. Neither class practised
any domestic virtues, or respected the institution of motherhood. The
process of the selection of the fittest for survival for the purpose of
parentage, and for the consummation of the evolutionary gradation, through
which the human race is apparently destined to pass, was again in abeyance
for a series of generations.

In our own times, the fate of nations and the destiny of their people would
seem to depend upon the size of the fighting force and the efficiency of
the ships we build; our ability to dicker and barter, to gain a
questionable commercial supremacy, and the loquaciousness of our
politicians. This, at least, is the criterion upon which the modern
statesman estimates the quality of present-day civilization. He is not [7]
apparently interested in the story of the ages. The progress of God's
supernal scheme through aeons of bigotry and darkness neither suggests nor
inspires in him a loftier constructive analysis. He is content to leave the
destiny of nations to tons of material, tons of men and tons of talk.

Nowhere do we find any reference to the quality of the blood-stream of the
people. Nor does it seem to have been discovered by those who wield
authority, that the glory of a nation depends upon its brains, not its
bulk; nor do they apprehend that the greatness