o much incredulity. It has been
reserved for this generation to propagate the absurdity that the want
of money is the root of all evil; all the wisest teachers of mankind
have hitherto been disposed to think differently, and criminal
statistics are far from demonstrating that they are wrong. In the
laudable efforts which are now being made, and which ought to be made
to heighten the material well-being of the community, it is a mistake
to assume, as is too often done, that mere material prosperity, even
if spread over the whole population, will ever succeed in banishing
crime. A mere increase of material prosperity generates as many evils
as it destroys; it may diminish offences against property, but it
augments offences against the person, and multiplies drunkenness to an
alarming extent. While it is an undoubted fact that material
wretchedness has a debasing effect both morally and physically, it is
also equally true that the same results are sometimes found to flow
from an increase of economic well-being. An interesting proof of this
is to be found in the recent investigations of M. Chopinet, a French
military surgeon, respecting the stature of the population in the
central Pyrenees. M. Chopinet, after a careful examination of the
conscript registers from 1873 to 1888, arrives at the following
conclusions as to what determines the physical condition of the
population. After discussing the cosmical influences and the evil
effects of poverty and bad hygienic arrangements on the people, he
proceeds to point out that moral corruption arising from material
prosperity is also a powerful factor in producing physical degeneracy.
He singles out one canton--the canton of Luchon--as being the victim
of its own prosperity. In this canton, he says, that the old
simplicity of life has departed, in consequence of its prodigious
prosperity. "Vices formerly unknown have penetrated into the country;
the frequenting of public houses and the habit of keeping late hours
have taken the place of the open air sports which used to be the
favoured method of enjoyment. Illegitimate births, formerly very rare,
have multiplied, syphilis even has spread among the young. Food of a
less substantial character has superseded the diet of former times,
and, in short, alcoholism, precocious debauchery, and syphilis have
come like so many plagues to arrest the development of the youth and
seriously debilitate the population."[24]

[24] _Revue Scient