The St. Johns herald., 1889-05-16
Race DegeneraCy.


 race degeneracy on the other. For it is the record ot history as to na- tions that have ceased to be, that the earliest signs of decay were those that betoken a loss of physi- cal vigor The forces now opera ting for the injury of public health are more forceful than in any age which has preceded it. In this we do not refer to the results of squalid wretchedness, which have been quite the same in every age, but to those devitalizing and enervating forces that are active amid high occupa- tions and are the outcome of our present civilization. Factory indus tries have become relatively much more prominent than laborers in the field or on the sea. Not only do indoor occupations cause a great CT tax upon physical vIsor, but mod ern appliances, instead of relieving, often complicate the problem Ger tain habits, too, have so gained in their prominence and potency and in the period in which they are ac- quired as to greatly impair the wig or of population. It would be a comfort if these results could be confined to single generation; but what we now know of the laws of heredity gives to them a fearful sig nificance. The generation that uses It's eyes in reading on the cars and by the brilliant light of gas or elec- tricitv is sure, not only to create a greater demand for spectacies in the next generation, but to multiply in definitely various forms of imper- feet vision. The parent who in dulges largely in the use of tobac- co and who, perhaps, began with his cigarette in childhood, may sur vive the slow and insidious effect, but there is too often an inheri- tance of weakened muscle, fabby heart, disordcrcd nerve, or over-sen- sitive brain. The entailments of alcohol, in all it's forms from wine to beer, are too numerous to cata- logue in any single age, and contin- ue their influence along the line of posterity. It is not that as a rule the heredity shows itself by the in- heritance of the very same habit, or by the reproduction of the same change of structure; but even this is often the case. The child early in life may begin to show morbid cravings which culminate in the very same inordinate desires. It is also true even oftener still that the same diseases are inherited either as tendency of perverted function or as a result of structural change. How often we say: "HoW much the boy resembles the father" the same color of eye and hair, the same shape of nose, the same general con- tour of features. Even so lungs, liver, and heart and other organs inherit size or shape or power, and so the changed makeup of the man is the legacy more lasting than any conveyed in the last will and testa- ment. Those who are studying these problems of race are not the orists, but find in the facts before them a full support to what reason and judgment indicate. A recent writer on the influence of town-life gives comparisons as to the meas urement of men of various nation alities, and then shows that "the loss of physique, of muscular to- nicity, vital capacity, and vital force" are unquestionable. As to the influence of bad habits he no- tices especially intemperance, and adds that "the various forms of i'm purity smite with devitalizing sever ity the offspring of the third and fourth generations" The great de- ception is that the effects of evil influences are not always apparent