New Ulm review. (New Ulm, Brown County, Minn.) 1892-1961, 1894-02-07


ter Calibans at every street corner. Nor
is it as in the classic woods of Greece,
where impure Satyrs watched furtively
from behind their leafy coverts for a
rarely passing nymph. Our modern
Satyrs are elegantly dressed, and leer
openly at every pretty woman in our
public places.
Nature sterilizes women of immoral
lives. Immoral men should be steri]ized
also, but this can only be done by artifi-
cial means. Jesus said, ''Some are born
eunuchs, some are made eunuchs, and
others have become eunucbs for the king
dom of Heavens sake" The sanity
Origen emasculated himself. What has
been done from religion, luxury, or
choice, may be done again from aecessi-
ty. It might easily be made a physical
impossibility for criminals, hereditary
paupers, profigates, and others suffering
from gross bodily or mental defects to
propagate their failings and their vices.
The scientific improvement of our race
is one of the great measures of the future,
and will be taken in hand as soon as the
nation is sufficiently enlightened as to it's
necessity. We cannot go on for ever
permitting swarms of weak and depraved
creatures to flood society with lunatics,
idiots, criminals, and other defective Off
spring. Their maintenance and control
alone constitute serious menace to the
welfare of the industrious and deserving
poor. Their contagious and vicious ex-
ample outwei CHS the efforts of mission
aries and reformers, who are, as it were,
for ever rolling Sisyphean stone. We
Danish or isolate physical leprosy, which
once abounded in this island, and thus
extirpete it. Moral leprosy may have to
be subjected to similar treatment.
The Spartans afforded a remarkable
instance of what could be done by selec-
tion, careful breeding, and systematic
education. A little State of few thou
sand citizens overawed Greece and de-
fed the countless hosts of Persia. Mar
athun, Salamis, and Plataea ring out clear
and spirit. stirring after the lapse of twen-
ty-four centuries.
The early Romans retained much of
the Lacedaemonians' spirit. They took
especial pains to preserve purity of blood.
| When Cato lent his wife toHortenslus, it
was from no immoral motive, but from
a high sense of public duty. Hortensius
was "goodly man." his physical anc
mental excellencies were appreciated by
his friend, and therefore he selected him
as his deputy to raise up children to the
State. And Cato is esteemed a model
citizen and ratriot. One of the greatest
punishments inflicted on the Romans
was the withdrawal of the privilege of
| lcuulnS llelf WIVES.
Spartan and Roman requirements diff
fered from ours, and thus our methods
must differ also from theirs. We should,
however, pursue the same object - the
mental and physical perfection of our
race - by means suitable to our time
and place. Marriage should be resolute-
ly discouraged where the parties are un-
fit through any disqualification. Where
community has taken upon itself the
burden Of the support of all, it should
have the power of regulating the action
of individuals in SO far as they create the
difficulty. We prevent the inmates of
our prisons, workhouses, and asylums
from sexual intercourse. We even sep
crate the married. What should hinder
us from carrying out the principle far
ther, and to its full logical extent.
A man imbued with these ideas would
no more think of marrying woman of
defective physique or one possessing
hereditary taint, than he would of pur-
chasing broken -winded racer to run in
the Derby. However fair she might be.
he would institute a careful inquiry into
her family history before proposing.
And a woman would do the same. She
would decline to become the mother of
line of puny and dyspeptic weaklings
Fathers would mate their daughters at
least as carefully as they mate their dogs
and horses. And the State would make
it serious crime for an unhealthy par
ent to produce child. A license to
marry should be given by Medical
Board, and not by a priest. Marriage
then would be sacred privilege; it
would be highly valued, and SO held in
much honor; it would be mark of the
worthiest, and would conduce to gener-
al emulation in worth. In a word, it
would be a reign of the fit, instead, as
now, of the unfit. Society would stamp
out disease and crime, as it has stamped
out the rinderpest. Under such condi-
tions what a glorious country would this
old England of ours be2 Modesty and
o<o M VTTo.1kh