1 What is the author trying to prove What is h.docx

1
What is the author trying to prove?
What is his position on morality?
Does he agree with the mainstream morality, human virtues?
If Yes/No then why?
Do you see similarities between the excerpt from “Thus Spake
Zarathustra” and
“Beyond good and Evil?” What are they?
Do you agree with the author generally? If yes/no why?
Thus Spake Zarathustra
Friedrich Nietzsche
(excerpt )
When Zarathustra arrived at the nearest town which adjoineth
the forest,
he found many people assembled in the market-place; for it had
been
announced that a rope-dancer would give a performance. And
Zarathustra spake thus unto the people:
I TEACH YOU THE SUPERMAN. Man is something that is to
be
surpassed. What have ye done to surpass man?
All beings hitherto have created something beyond themselves:

and ye
want to be the ebb of that great tide, and would rather go back
to the
beast than surpass man?
What is the ape to man? A laughing-stock, a thing of shame.
And just the
same shall man be to the Superman: a laughing-stock, a thing of
shame.
Ye have made your way from the worm to man, and much
within you is
still worm. Once were ye apes, and even yet man is more of an
ape than
any of the apes.
Even the wisest among you is only a disharmony and hybrid of
plant and
phantom. But do I bid you become phantoms or plants?
Lo, I teach you the Superman!
The Superman is the meaning of the earth. Let your will say:
The
Superman SHALL BE the meaning of the earth!
I conjure you, my brethren, REMAIN TRUE TO THE EARTH,
and believe
not those who speak unto you of superearthly hopes! Poisoners
are they,
2

whether they know it or not.
Despisers of life are they, decaying ones and poisoned ones
themselves,
of whom the earth is weary: so away with them!
Once blasphemy against God was the greatest blasphemy; but
God died,
and therewith also those blasphemers. To blaspheme the earth is
now the
dreadfulest sin, and to rate the heart of the unknowable higher
than the
meaning of the earth!
Once the soul looked contemptuously on the body, and then that
contempt was the supreme thing:—the soul wished the body
meagre,
ghastly, and famished. Thus it thought to escape from the body
and the
earth.
Oh, that soul was itself meagre, ghastly, and famished; and
cruelty was
the delight of that soul!
But ye, also, my brethren, tell me: What doth your body say
about your
soul? Is your soul not poverty and pollution and wretched self-
complacency?
Verily, a polluted stream is man. One must be a sea, to receive a
polluted
stream without becoming impure.
Lo, I teach you the Superman: he is that sea; in him can your

great
contempt be submerged.
What is the greatest thing ye can experience? It is the hour of
great
contempt. The hour in which even your happiness becometh
loathsome
unto you, and so also your reason and virtue.
The hour when ye say: "What good is my happiness! It is
poverty and
pollution and wretched self-complacency. But my happiness
should justify
existence itself!"
The hour when ye say: "What good is my reason! Doth it long
for
knowledge as the lion for his food? It is poverty and pollution
and
wretched self-complacency!"
The hour when ye say: "What good is my virtue! As yet it hath
not made
3
me passionate. How weary I am of my good and my bad! It is
all poverty
and pollution and wretched self-complacency!"
The hour when ye say: "What good is my justice! I do not see
that I am

fervour and fuel. The just, however, are fervour and fuel!"
The hour when ye say: "What good is my pity! Is not pity the
cross on
which he is nailed who loveth man? But my pity is not a
crucifixion."
Have ye ever spoken thus? Have ye ever cried thus? Ah! would
that I had
heard you crying thus!
It is not your sin—it is your self-satisfaction that crieth unto
heaven; your
very sparingness in sin crieth unto heaven!
Where is the lightning to lick you with its tongue? Where is the
frenzy with
which ye should be inoculated?
Lo, I teach you the Superman: he is that lightning, he is that
frenzy!—
When Zarathustra had thus spoken, one of the people called out:
"We
have now heard enough of the rope-dancer; it is time now for us
to see
him!" And all the people laughed at Zarathustra. But the rope-
dancer, who
thought the words applied to him, began his performance.
Zarathustra, however, looked at the people and wondered. Then
he spake
thus:
Man is a rope stretched between the animal and the Superman—

a rope
over an abyss.
A dangerous crossing, a dangerous wayfaring, a dangerous
looking-back,
a dangerous trembling and halting.
What is great in man is that he is a bridge and not a goal: what
is lovable
in man is that he is an OVER-GOING and a DOWN-GOING.
I love those that know not how to live except as down-goers, for
they are
the over-goers.
4
I love the great despisers, because they are the great adorers,
and arrows
of longing for the other shore.
I love those who do not first seek a reason beyond the stars for
going
down and being sacrifices, but sacrifice themselves to the earth,
that the
earth of the Superman may hereafter arrive.
I love him who liveth in order to know, and seeketh to know in
order that
the Superman may hereafter live. Thus seeketh he his own
down-going.

I love him who laboureth and inventeth, that he may build the
house for
the Superman, and prepare for him earth, animal, and plant: for
thus
seeketh he his own down-going.
I love him who loveth his virtue: for virtue is the will to down-
going, and an
arrow of longing.
I love him who reserveth no share of spirit for himself, but
wanteth to be
wholly the spirit of his virtue: thus walketh he as spirit over the
bridge.
I love him who maketh his virtue his inclination and destiny:
thus, for the
sake of his virtue, he is willing to live on, or live no more.
I love him who desireth not too many virtues. One virtue is
more of a virtue
than two, because it is more of a knot for one's destiny to cling
to.
I love him whose soul is lavish, who wanteth no thanks and doth
not give
back: for he always bestoweth, and desireth not to keep for
himself.
I love him who is ashamed when the dice fall in his favour, and
who then
asketh: "Am I a dishonest player?"—for he is willing to
succumb.
I love him who scattereth golden words in advance of his deeds,
and

always doeth more than he promiseth: for he seeketh his own
down-
going.
I love him who justifieth the future ones, and redeemeth the
past ones: for
he is willing to succumb through the present ones.
I love him who chasteneth his God, because he loveth his God:
for he
must succumb through the wrath of his God.
5
I love him whose soul is deep even in the wounding, and may
succumb
through a small matter: thus goeth he willingly over the bridge.
I love him whose soul is so overfull that he forgetteth himself,
and all
things are in him: thus all things become his down-going.
I love him who is of a free spirit and a free heart: thus is his
head only the
bowels of his heart; his heart, however, causeth his down-going.
I love all who are like heavy drops falling one by one out of the
dark cloud
that lowereth over man: they herald the coming of the lightning,
and
succumb as heralds.

Lo, I am a herald of the lightning, and a heavy drop out of the
cloud: the
lightning, however, is the SUPERMAN.
When Zarathustra had spoken these words, he again looked at
the
people, and was silent. "There they stand," said he to his heart;
"there
they laugh: they understand me not; I am not the mouth for
these ears.
Must one first batter their ears, that they may learn to hear with
their
eyes? Must one clatter like kettledrums and penitential
preachers? Or do
they only believe the stammerer?
They have something whereof they are proud. What do they call
it, that
which maketh them proud? Culture, they call it; it
distinguisheth them
from the goatherds.
They dislike, therefore, to hear of 'contempt' of themselves. So I
will
appeal to their pride.
I will speak unto them of the most contemptible thing: that,
however, is
THE LAST MAN!"
And thus spake Zarathustra unto the people:
It is time for man to fix his goal. It is time for man to plant the
germ of his
highest hope.

Still is his soil rich enough for it. But that soil will one day be
poor and
exhausted, and no lofty tree will any longer be able to grow
thereon.
6
Alas! there cometh the time when man will no longer launch the
arrow of
his longing beyond man—and the string of his bow will have
unlearned to
whizz!
I tell you: one must still have chaos in one, to give birth to a
dancing star. I
tell you: ye have still chaos in you.
Alas! There cometh the time when man will no longer give birth
to any
star. Alas! There cometh the time of the most despicable man,
who can
no longer despise himself.
Lo! I show you THE LAST MAN.
"What is love? What is creation? What is longing? What is a
star?"—so
asketh the last man and blinketh.
The earth hath then become small, and on it there hoppeth the

last man
who maketh everything small. His species is ineradicable like
that of the
ground-flea; the last man liveth longest.
"We have discovered happiness"—say the last men, and blink
thereby.
They have left the regions where it is hard to live; for they need
warmth.
One still loveth one's neighbour and rubbeth against him; for
one needeth
warmth.
Turning ill and being distrustful, they consider sinful: they walk
warily. He
is a fool who still stumbleth over stones or men!
A little poison now and then: that maketh pleasant dreams. And
much
poison at last for a pleasant death.
One still worketh, for work is a pastime. But one is careful lest
the pastime
should hurt one.
One no longer becometh poor or rich; both are too burdensome.
Who still
wanteth to rule? Who still wanteth to obey? Both are too
burdensome.
No shepherd, and one herd! Every one wanteth the same; every
one is
equal: he who hath other sentiments goeth voluntarily into the
madhouse.

7
"Formerly all the world was insane,"—say the subtlest of them,
and blink
thereby.
They are clever and know all that hath happened: so there is no
end to
their raillery. People still fall out, but are soon reconciled—
otherwise it
spoileth their stomachs.
They have their little pleasures for the day, and their little
pleasures for the
night, but they have a regard for health.
"We have discovered happiness,"—say the last men, and blink
thereby.—
And here ended the first discourse of Zarathustra, which is also
called
"The Prologue": for at this point the shouting and mirth of the
multitude
interrupted him. "Give us this last man, O Zarathustra,"—they
called out—
"make us into these last men! Then will we make thee a present
of the
Superman!" And all the people exulted and smacked their lips.
Zarathustra, however, turned sad, and said to his heart:
"They understand me not: I am not the mouth for these ears.

Too long, perhaps, have I lived in the mountains; too much have
I
hearkened unto the brooks and trees: now do I speak unto them
as unto
the goatherds.
Calm is my soul, and clear, like the mountains in the morning.
But they
think me cold, and a mocker with terrible jests.
And now do they look at me and laugh: and while they laugh
they hate me
too. There is ice in their laughter."
Beyond Good and Evil
Friedrich Nietzsche
(excerpt )
202. Let us at once say again what we have already said a
hundred times,
for people's ears nowadays are unwilling to hear such truths—
OUR truths.
8

We know well enough how offensive it sounds when any one
plainly, and
without metaphor, counts man among the animals, but it will be
accounted to us almost a CRIME, that it is precisely in respect
to men of
"modern ideas" that we have constantly applied the terms
"herd," "herd-
instincts," and such like expressions. What avail is it? We
cannot do
otherwise, for it is precisely here that our new insight is. We
have found
that in all the principal moral judgments, Europe has become
unanimous,
including likewise the countries where European influence
prevails in
Europe people evidently KNOW what Socrates thought he did
not know,
and what the famous serpent of old once promised to teach—
they "know"
today what is good and evil. It must then sound hard and be
distasteful to
the ear, when we always insist that that which here thinks it
knows, that
which here glorifies itself with praise and blame, and calls itself

good, is
the instinct of the herding human animal, the instinct which has
come and
is ever coming more and more to the front, to preponderance
and
supremacy over other instincts, according to the increasing
physiological
approximation and resemblance of which it is the symptom.
MORALITY
IN EUROPE AT PRESENT IS HERDING-ANIMAL
MORALITY, and
therefore, as we understand the matter, only one kind of human
morality,
beside which, before which, and after which many other
moralities, and
above all HIGHER moralities, are or should be possible.
Against such a
"possibility," against such a "should be," however, this morality
defends
itself with all its strength, it says obstinately and inexorably "I
am morality
itself and nothing else is morality!" Indeed, with the help of a
religion
which has humoured and flattered the sublimest desires of the
herding-

animal, things have reached such a point that we always find a
more
visible expression of this morality even in political and social
arrangements: the DEMOCRATIC movement is the inheritance
of the
9
Christian movement. That its TEMPO, however, is much too
slow and
sleepy for the more impatient ones, for those who are sick and
distracted
by the herding-instinct, is indicated by the increasingly furious
howling,
and always less disguised teeth-gnashing of the anarchist dogs,
who are
now roving through the highways of European culture.
Apparently in
opposition to the peacefully industrious democrats and
Revolution-
ideologues, and still more so to the awkward philosophasters
and

fraternity-visionaries who call themselves Socialists and want a
"free
society," those are really at one with them all in their thorough
and
instinctive hostility to every form of society other than that of
the
AUTONOMOUS herd (to the extent even of repudiating the
notions
"master" and "servant"—ni dieu ni maitre, says a socialist
formula); at one
in their tenacious opposition to every special claim, every
special right and
privilege (this means ultimately opposition to EVERY right, for
when all are
equal, no one needs "rights" any longer); at one in their distrust
of punitive
justice (as though it were a violation of the weak, unfair to the
NECESSARY consequences of all former society); but equally
at one in
their religion of sympathy, in their compassion for all that feels,
lives, and
suffers (down to the very animals, up even to "God"—the
extravagance of
"sympathy for God" belongs to a democratic age); altogether at
one in the

cry and impatience of their sympathy, in their deadly hatred of
suffering
generally, in their almost feminine incapacity for witnessing it
or
ALLOWING it; at one in their involuntary beglooming and
heart-softening,
under the spell of which Europe seems to be threatened with a
new
Buddhism; at one in their belief in the morality of MUTUAL
sympathy, as
though it were morality in itself, the climax, the ATTAINED
climax of
mankind, the sole hope of the future, the consolation of the
present, the
great discharge from all the obligations of the past; altogether at
one in
10
their belief in the community as the DELIVERER, in the herd,
and therefore
in "themselves."

What is Noble?
257. EVERY elevation of the type "man," has hitherto been the
work of an
aristocratic society and so it will always be—a society believing
in a long
scale of gradations of rank and differences of worth among
human
beings, and requiring slavery in some form or other. Without
the PATHOS
OF DISTANCE, such as grows out of the incarnated difference
of classes,
out of the constant out-looking and down-looking of the ruling
caste on
subordinates and instruments, and out of their equally constant
practice
of obeying and commanding, of keeping down and keeping at a
distance—that other more mysterious pathos could never have
arisen, the
longing for an ever new widening of distance within the soul
itself, the
formation of ever higher, rarer, further, more extended, more
comprehensive states, in short, just the elevation of the type
"man," the
continued "self-surmounting of man," to use a moral formula in

a
supermoral sense. To be sure, one must not resign oneself to
any
humanitarian illusions about the history of the origin of an
aristocratic
society (that is to say, of the preliminary condition for the
elevation of the
type "man"): the truth is hard. Let us acknowledge
unprejudicedly how
every higher civilization hitherto has ORIGINATED! Men with
a still natural
nature, barbarians in every terrible sense of the word, men of
prey, still in
possession of unbroken strength of will and desire for power,
threw
themselves upon weaker, more moral, more peaceful races
(perhaps
11
trading or cattle-rearing communities), or upon old mellow
civilizations in
which the final vital force was flickering out in brilliant

fireworks of wit and
depravity. At the commencement, the noble caste was always
the
barbarian caste: their superiority did not consist first of all in
their physical,
but in their psychical power—they were more COMPLETE men
(which at
every point also implies the same as "more complete beasts").
1
Francis Galton: Inquiries into Human Faculty and its
Development
(1883)
Selection and Race
The fact of an individual being naturally gifted with high
qualities, may be
due either to his being an exceptionally good specimen of a
poor race, or

an average specimen of a high one. The difference of origin
would betray
itself in his descendants; they would revert towards the typical
centre of
their race, deteriorating in the first case but not in the second.
The two
cases, though theoretically distinct, are confused in reality,
owing to the
frequency with which exceptional personal qualities connote the
departure of the entire nature of the individual from his
ancestral type, and
the formation of a new strain having its own typical centre. It is
hardly
necessary to add that it is in this indirect way that natural
selection
improves a race. The two events of selection and difference of
race ought,
however, to be carefully distinguished in broad practical
considerations,
while the frequency of their concurrence is borne in mind and
allowed for.
So long as the race remains radically the same, the stringent
selection of

the best specimens to rear and breed from, can never lead to any
permanent result. The attempt to raise the standard of such a
race is like
the labour of Sisyphus in rolling his stone uphill; let the effort
be relaxed
for a moment, and the stone will roll back. Whenever a new
typical centre
appears, it is as though there was a facet upon the lower surface
of the
stone, on which it is capable of resting without rolling back. It
affords a
temporary sticking-point in the forward progress of evolution.
The causes
that check the unlimited improvement of highly-bred animals,
so long as
2
the race remains unchanged, are many and absolute.
In the first place there is an increasing delicacy of constitution;
the
growing fineness of limb and structure end, after a few
generations, in

fragility. Overbred animals have little stamina; they resemble in
this
respect the "weedy" colts so often reared from first-class racers.
One can
perhaps see in a general way why this should be so. Each
individual is the
outcome of a vast number of organic elements of the most
various
species, just as some nation might be the outcome of a vast
number of
castes of individuals, each caste monopolising a special pursuit.
Banish a
number of the humbler castes–the bakers, the bricklayers, and
the smiths,
and the nation would soon come to grief. This is what is done in
high
breeding; certain qualities are bred for, and the rest are
diminished as far
as possible, but they cannot be dispensed with entirely.
The next difficulty lies in the diminished fertility of highly-bred
animals. It is
not improbable that its cause is of the same character as that of
the

delicacy of their constitution. Together with infertility is
combined some
degree of sexual indifference, or when passion is shown, it is
not
unfrequently for some specimen of a coarser type. This is
certainly the
case with horses and with dogs.
It will be easily understood that these difficulties, which are so
formidable
in the case of plants andanimals, which we can mate as we
please and
destroy when we please, would make the maintenance of a
highly-
selected breed of men an impossibility.
Whenever a low race is preserved under conditions of life that
exact a
3
high level of efficiency, it must be subjected to rigorous
selection. The few
best specimens of that race can alone be allowed to become

parents, and
not many of their descendants can be allowed to live. On the
other hand,
if a higher race be substituted for the low one, all this terrible
misery
disappears. The most merciful form of what I ventured to call
"eugenics"
would consist in watching for the indications of superior strains
or races,
and in so favouring them that their progeny shall outnumber and
gradually
replace that of the old one. Such strains are of no infrequent
occurrence.
It is easy to specify families who are characterised by strong
resemblances, and whose features and character are usually
prepotent
over those of their wives or husbands in their joint offspring,
and who are
at the same time as prolific as the average of their class. These
strains
can be conveniently studied in the families of exiles, which, for
obvious
reasons, are easy to trace in their various branches.

The debt that most countries owe to the race of men whom they
received
from one another as immigrants, whether leaving their native
country of
their own free will, or as exiles on political or religious
grounds, has been
often pointed out, and may, I think, be accounted for as
follows:–The fact
of a man leaving his compatriots, or so irritating them that they
compel
him to go, is fair evidence that either he or they, or both, feel
that his
character is alien to theirs. Exiles are also on the whole men of
considerable force of character; a quiet man would endure and
succumb,
he would not have energy to transplant himself or to become so
conspicuous as to be an object of general attack. We may justly
infer from
this, that exiles are on the whole men of exceptional and
energetic
natures, and it is especially from such men as these that new
strains of
race are likely to proceed. Influence of Man Upon Race

4
The influence of man upon the nature of his own race has
already been
very large, but it has not been intelligently directed, and has in
many
instances done great harm. Its action has been by invasions and
migration
of races, by war and massacre, by wholesale deportation of
population,
by emigration, and by many social customs which have a silent
but
widespread effect.
There exists a sentiment, for the most part quite unreasonable,
against the
gradual extinction of an inferior race. It rests on some confusion
between
the race and the individual, as if the destruction of a race was
equivalent
to the destruction of a large number of men. It is nothing of the
kind when

the process of extinction works silently and slowly through the
earlier
marriage of members of the superior race, through their greater
vitality
under equal stress, through their better chances of getting a
livelihood, or
through their prepotency in mixed marriages. That the members
of an
inferior class should dislike being elbowed out of the way is
another
matter; but it may be somewhat brutally argued that whenever
two
individuals struggle for a single place, one must yield, and that
there will
be no more unhappiness on the whole, if the inferior yield to the
superior
than conversely, whereas the world will be permanently
enriched by the
success of the superior. The conditions of happiness are,
however, too
complex to be disposed of by à priori argument; it is safest to
appeal to
observation. I think it could be easily shown that when the
differences

between the races is not so great as to divide them into
obviously
different classes, and where their language, education, and
general
interests are the same, the substitution may take place gradually
without
5
any unhappiness. Thus the movements of commerce have
introduced
fresh and vigorous blood into various parts of England: the
new-comers
have intermarried with the residents, and theircharacteristics
have been
prepotent in the descendants of the mixed marriages. I have
referred in
the earlier part of the book to the changes of type in the English
nature
that have occurred during the last few hundred years. These
have been
effected so silently that we only know of them by the results.

One of the most misleading of words is that of "aborigines." Its
use dates
from the time when the cosmogony was thought to be young and
life to
be of very recent appearance. Its usual meaning seems to be
derived from
the supposition that nations disseminated themselves like
colonists from a
common centre about four thousand years, say 120 generations
ago, and
thenceforward occupied their lands undisturbed until the very
recent
historic period with which the narrator deals, when some
invading host
drove out the "aborigines." This idyllic view of the march of
events is
contradicted by ancient sepulchral remains, by language, and by
the
habits of those modern barbarians whose history we know.
There are
probably hardly any spots on the earth that have not, within the
last few
thousand years, been tenanted by very different races; none
hardly that

have not been tenanted by very different tribes having the
character of at
least sub-races.
The absence of a criterion to distinguish between races and sub-
races,
and our ethnological ignorance generally, makes it impossible
to offer
more than a very off-hand estimate of the average variety of
races in the
different countries of the world. I have, however, endeavoured
to form
one, which I give with much hesitation, knowing how very little
it is worth. I
6
registered the usually recognised races inhabiting each of
upwards of
twenty countries, and who at the same time formed at least half
per cent
of the population. It was, I am perfectly aware, a very rough
proceeding,

so rough that for the United Kingdom I ignored the prehistoric
types and
accepted only the three headings of British, Low Dutch, and
Norman-
French. Again, as regards India I registered as follows:–Forest
tribes
(numerous), Dravidian (three principal divisions), Early Arian,
Tartar
(numerous, including Afghans), Arab, and lastly European, on
account of
their political importance, notwithstanding the fewness of their
numbers.
Proceeding in this off-hand way, and after considering the
results, the
broad conclusion to which I arrived was that on the average at
least three
different recognised races were to be found in every
moderately-sized
district on the earth's surface. The materials were far too scanty
to enable
any idea to be formed of the rate of change in the relative
numbers of the
constituent races in each country, and still less to estimate the
secular
changes of type in those races.

Population
Over-population and its attendant miseries may not improbably
become a
more serious subject of consideration than it ever yet has been,
owing to
improved sanitation and consequent diminution of the mortality
of
children, and to the filling up of the spare places of the earth
which are still
void and able to receive the overflow of Europe. There are no
doubt
conflicting possibilities which I need not stop to discuss.
The check to over-population mainly advocated by Malthus is a
prudential
7
delay in the time of marriage; but the practice of such a doctrine
would

assuredly be limited, and if limited it would be most prejudicial
to the race,
as I have pointed out in Hereditary Genius, but may be
permitted to do so
again. The doctrine would only be followed by the prudent and
self-
denying; it would be neglected by the impulsive and self-
seeking. Those
whose race we especially want to have, would leave few
descendants,
while those whose race we especially want to be quit of, would
crowd the
vacant space with their progeny, and the strain of population
would
thenceforward be just as pressing as before. There would have
been a
little relief during one or two generations, but no permanent
increase of
the general happiness, while the race of the nation would have
deteriorated. The practical application of the doctrine of
deferred marriage
would therefore lead indirectly to most mischievous results, that
were
overlooked owing to the neglect of considerations bearing on
race. While

criticising the main conclusion to which Malthus came, I must
take the
opportunity of paying my humble tribute of admiration to his
great and
original work, which seems to me like the rise of a morning star
before a
day of free social investigation. There is nothing whatever in
his book that
would be in the least offensive to this generation, but he wrote
in advance
of his time and consequently roused virulent attacks, notably
from his
fellow-clergymen, whose doctrinaire notions upon the paternal
dispensation of the world were rudely shocked.
The misery check, as Malthus called all those influences that
are not
prudential, is an ugly phrase not fully justified. It no doubt
includes death
through inadequate food and shelter, through pestilence from
overcrowding, through war, and the like; but it also includes
many causes
that do not deserve so hard a name. Population decays under

conditions
8
that cannot be charged to the presence or absence of misery, in
the
common sense of the word. These exist when native races
disappear
before the presence of the incoming white man, when after
making the
fullest allowances for imported disease, for brandy drinking,
and other
assignable causes, there is always a large residuum of effect not
clearly
accounted for. It is certainly not wholly due to misery, but
rather to
listlessness, due to discouragement, and acting adversely in
many ways.
One notable result of dulness and apathy is to make a person
unattractive
to the opposite sex and to be unattracted by them. It is
antagonistic to

sexual affection, and the result is a diminution of offspring.
There exists
strong evidence that the decay of population in some parts of
South
America under the irksome tyranny of the Jesuits, which
crushed what
little vivacity the people possessed, was due to this very cause.
One
cannot fairly apply the term "misery" to apathy; I should rather
say that
strong affections restrained from marriage by prudential
considerations
more truly deserved that name.
Endowments
Endowments and bequests have been freely and largely made for
various
social purposes, and as a matter of history they have frequently
been
made to portion girls in marriage. It so happens that the very
day that I am
writing this, I notice an account in the foreign newspapers
(September 19,

1882) of an Italian who has bequeathed a sum to the corporation
of
London to found small portions for three poor girls to be
selected by lot.
And again, a few weeks ago I read also in the French papers of
a trial, in
9
reference to the money adjudged to the "Rosière" of a certain
village.
Many cases in which individuals and states have portioned girls
may be
found in Malthus. It is therefore far from improbable that if the
merits of
good race became widely recognised and its indications were
rendered
more surely intelligible than they now are, that local
endowments, and
perhaps adoptions, might be made in favour of those of both
sexes who
showed evidences of high race and of belonging to prolific and
thriving

families. One cannot forecast their form, though we may reckon
with
some assurance that in one way or another they would be made,
and that
the better races would be given a better chance of marrying
early.
A curious relic of the custom which was universal three or four
centuries
ago, of entrusting education to celibate priests, forbade Fellows
of
Colleges to marry, under the penalty of losing their fellowships.
It is as
though the winning horses at races were rendered ineligible to
become
sires, which I need hardly say is the exact reverse of the
practice. Races
were established and endowed by "Queen's plates" and
otherwise at vast
expense, for the purpose of discovering the swiftest horses, who
are
thenceforward exempted from labour and reserved for the sole
purpose of
propagating their species. The horses who do not win races, or
who are

not otherwise specially selected for their natural gifts, are
prevented from
becoming sires. Similarly, the mares who win races as fillies,
are not
allowed to waste their strength in being ridden or driven, but
are tended
under sanitary conditions for the sole purpose of bearing
offspring. It is
better economy, in the long-run, to use the best mares as
breeders than
as workers, the loss through their withdrawal from active
service being
more than recouped in the next generation through what is
gained by their
progeny.
10
The college statutes to which I referred were very recently
relaxed at
Oxford, and have been just reformed at Cambridge. I am told
that
numerous marriages have ensued in consequence, or are

ensuing. In
Hereditary Genius I showed that scholastic success runs
strongly in
families; therefore, in all seriousness, I have no doubt, that the
number of
Englishmen naturally endowed with high scholastic faculties,
will be
sensibly increased in future generations by the repeal of these
ancient
statutes.
The English race has yet to be explored and their now unknown
wealth of
hereditary gifts recorded, that those who possess such a
patrimony
should know of it. The natural impulses of mankind would then
be
sufficient to ensure that such wealth should no more continue to
be
neglected than the existence of any other possession suddenly
made
known to a man. Aristocracies seldom make alliances out of
their order,
except to gain wealth. Is it less to be expected that those who
become

aware that they are endowed with the power of transmitting
valuable
hereditary gifts should abstain from squandering their future
children's
patrimony by marrying persons of lower natural stamp? The
social
consideration that would attach itself to high races would, it
may be
hoped, partly neutralise a social cause that is now very adverse
to the
early marriages of the most gifted, namely, the cost of living in
cultured
and refined society. A young man with a career before him
commonly
feels it would be an act of folly to hamper himself by too early
a marriage.
The doors of society that are freely open to a bachelor are
closed to a
married couple with small means, unless they bear patent
recommendations such as the public recognition of a natural
nobility
11

would give. The attitude of mind that I should expect to
predominate
among those who had undeniable claims to rank as members of
an
exceptionally gifted race, would be akin to that of the modern
possessors
of ancestral property or hereditary rank. Such persons feel it a
point of
honour not to alienate the old place or make misalliances, and
they are
respected for their honest family pride. So a man of good race
would
shrink from spoiling it by a lower marriage, and every one
would
sympathise with his sentiments.

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