Environment and Heredity--A New Embodiment of the supposed Conflict
between Socialism and Individualism--The Place of Eugenics--Social
Hygiene ultimately one with the Hygiene of the Soul--The Function
of Utopias.

The controversy between Individualism and Socialism, the claim of the
personal unit as against the claim of the collective community, is of
ancient date. Yet it is ever new and constantly presented afresh. It
even seems to become more acute as civilization progresses. Every scheme
of social reform, every powerful manifestation of individual energy,
raise anew a problem that is never out of date.

It is inevitable, indeed, that with the development of social hygiene
during the past hundred years there should also develop a radical
opposition of opinion as to the methods by which such hygiene ought to
be accomplished. There has always been this opposition in the political
sphere; it is natural to find it also in the social sphere. The very
fact that old-fashioned politics are becoming more and more transformed
into questions of social hygiene itself ensures the continuance of such
an opposition.

In politics, and especially in the politics of constitutional countries
of which England is the type, there are normally two parties. There is
the party that holds by tradition, by established order and solidarity,
the maintenance of the ancient hierarchical constitution of society, and
in general distinguishes itself by a preference for the old over the
new. There is, on the other side, the party that insists on progress, on
freedom, on the reasonable demands of the individual, on the adaptation
of the accepted order to changing conditions, and in general
distinguishes itself by a preference for the new over the old. The first
may be called the party of structure, and the second the party of
function. In England we know the adherents of one party as Conservatives
and those of the other party as Liberals or Radicals.

In time, it is true, these normal distinctions between the party of
structure and the party of function tend to become somewhat confused;
and it is precisely the transition of politics into the social sphere
which tends to introduce confusion. With a political system which
proceeds ultimately out of a society with a feudalistic basis, the
normal attitude of political parties is long maintained. The party of
structure, the Conservative party, holds by the ancient feudalistic
ideals whic