Los Angeles herald. [microfilm reel] (Los Angeles [Calif.]) 1900-1911, 1908-07-03

lKME very simply and very lucid
VI MI ly, also the subject o
vi "atavism" or reversion t.
! lYzh42NfzSll older and lower types: "a
child may bear little like
ness to mother or father; 1t may d.
more like it's grandfather or 1t!
| aunt. . 1t is as though every
dead foreparent, back to the dimmes
| horizon of time, were liable to put {
ghostly finger in the pie, to mend or t
mar it." And in this connection thu
author bids us remember that Some
of our ancestors conquered at Hast
ings; some did not. Some held the pas:
at Thermopylae; others ran away al
Bunker Hill. Some were saints; some
petty Iarcenists. Some were philoso-
pliers; some pirates. Some were knights
Grant some savages; some gentle
ladies; some apes and some hogs. AND
we inherit from all. He that is without
inherited faint let him cast the first
stone"
"sin," Mr.. Blatchford. like the
Christian Scientist, says, docs not
evist"; though he uses quite
other arguments to prove 1t.
laws as well as good, a crime may be
good act instead of bad act.
Morals are the standard of social con-
duct. That act (and that only
is immoral which needlessly Injuries 9
fellow creature" We have to remem-
Der, however, that there is hardly any
act a man can perform which does not
affect his fellow creatures. 1.-THE man
who drinks or neglects his health for
instance, becomes a less agreeable and
useful member of society, taking more
from the common stock and giving
back less" He points out that a player
in a field game team who drank, or who
fielded carelessly, would be acting I'M
morally toward the rest of the team
Morals come not by revelation, but by
evolution; being based, not upon the
commands of God, but upon the needs
of man."
Having traced the growth of moral
law coincidentally with the develop
ment of society, and predicted as the
final triumph, the union of the nations
in one brotherhood and the abolition OF
war;" Mr. Blatchford proceeds to de-
fine morals, which he differentiates into
two classes-the true and the artificial
The true morals he defines as those
founded on the rule that it Is wrong to
cause needless injury to a fellow crea-
ture; while by artificial morals he
means those invented by priests, kings
lawyers, poets, soldiers and philos-
ophers-"expedients for the most part"
And, inasmuch as that which is ex-
pedient for a king, a tyrant or an
aristocracy. may be far otherwise for
the people, so we need not be surprised
that the laws of many nations are inn
moral laws. THE British game laws,
land laws, poor laws and many of the
criminal laws and laws relating to prop
erty are immoral" And Great Britain
stands not alone in this, by any means.
But" says Mr.. Blatchford, mo revela-
ton of God condemns those laws. nor
does the church oppose or denounce
them as immoral"
The social feelings from which moral
ity sprang were inherited partly from
our animal ancestors and partly derived
from observation of the animals he
knew in his wild life. TT was the
social feelings of men that made their
bibles the bibles did not make the
social feelings
1.-THE Ancestral Struggle Within Us"
forms the subject of chapter V, and is
chiefly concerned with showing the
endless variety of sources from which
any one John Smith derives his make
up; showing that he is not one, but
almost infinitely many; and cannot,
therefore, be classed as good" or
bad" or distinctly "this" or that"
many things by turns"
1t would be unfair to the author
(whose book everyone should-and
since it is cheap almost everyone can
read for HIMSELF to quote exhaustive
ly the short, crisp, crystal-clear sem
fences in which this and much more
is so clearly set forth. This chapter
is long one, but there Is not a super
fluous or redundant word in 1t.
Mr. .Blatchford instances two char
acters so opposite the one to the other
as Torquemada and st. Francis, as
having had one thing in common: re-
ligiouS zeal; but in one 1t fruited in
curses, in the other in blessings. Pug
nacity Is good when used against tyr
amy or wrong; bad when used against
liberty or right" A magic key this to
the Bottom Dog problem.
To the objection that has sometimes
been urged as belying the workings of
heredity: That great geniuses like
Shakespeare, Plato, Caesar or Soc
rates do not have children as great as
themselves, Mr.. Blatchford retorts with
much force: "But the great mans son
is not born of the same parents as his
father!" All these points, as links In
the chain of his closely woven argu-
ment, the author Celebrates in way
that is never obscure, never dull.
OF the "born criminal he says there
is no such thing; but there are some
unfortunate creatures born with a ma
ture prone to crime; as others are
prone to disease. Regarded as
wicked" they are really the victims
of atavism, or degeneracy; as mucn 70
be pitied and as little to be blamed as
those born with a proneness to con-
sumption. 1--WE don't call the wolf or
the adder wicked then why can
wicked the atavist whose misfortun ne
lies In the fact that he is bred pack 70
that kind of reason which, amongst the
cave men, perhaps, made a man
leader or hero, but which today con con
stitutes him a born criminal Mature,
or God, having cursed the poor wretch
with a heritage of shame, we, in the
name Of humanity and JUSTICE al punish ,n,sn
and execrate him for his fatai mis-
cboice ~ ancestors. 1t is as though
we should fiog gorilla or hyena for
having wickedly' refused ed to M De 60pn 4
canon of the church OF '0'''
To the claim that the born crimi-
nal" might be a sober, law-abldlng
aakoIIioavk APan-