Gilbert K. Chesterton - Eugenics and Other Evils, Chesterton Gilbert Keith
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Eugenics and Other Evilsby G.K. Chesterton1922PART ONE: THE FALSE THEORYI What is Eugenics?II The First ObstaclesIII The Anarchy from AboveIV The Lunatic and the LawV The Flying AuthorityVI The Unanswered ChallengeVII The Established Church of DoubtVIII A Summary of a False TheoryPART TWO: THE REAL AIMI The Impotence of ImpenitenceII True History of a TrampIII True History of a EugenistIV The Vengeance of the FleshV The Meanness of the MotiveVI The Eclipse of LibertyVII The Transformation of SocialismVIII The End of the Household GodsIX A Short Chapter+ + +TO THE READERI publish these essays at the present time for a particular reasonconnected with the present situation; a reason which I shouldlike briefly to emphasize and make clear.Though most of the conclusions, especially towards the end, are conceivedwith reference to recent events, the actual bulk of preliminarynotes about the science of Eugenics were written before the war.It was a time when this theme was the topic of the hour; when eugenicbabies --- not visibly very distinguishable from other babies ---sprawled all over the illustrated papers; when the evolutionaryfancy of Nietzsche was the new cry among the intellectuals;and when Mr. Bernard Shaw and others were considering the ideathat to breed a man like a cart-horse was the true way toattain that higher civilization, of intellectual magnanimityand sympathetic insight, which may be found in cart-horses. Itmay therefore appear that I took the opinion too controversially,and it seems to me that I some times took it too seriously.But the criticism of Eugenics soon expanded of itself into a moregeneral criticism of a modern craze for scientific officialismand strict social organization.And then the hour came when I felt, not without relief, that I might wellfling all my notes into the fire. The fire was a very big one, and wasburning up bigger things than such pedantic quackeries. And, anyhow,the issue itself was being settled in a very different style.Scientific officialism and organization in the State which had specializedin them, had gone to war with the older culture of Christendom.Either Prussianism would win and the protest would be hopeless,or Prussianism would lose and the protest would be needless.As the war advanced from poison gas to piracy against neutrals,it grew more and more plain that the scientifically organized Statewas not increasing in popularity. Whatever happened, no Englishmenwould ever again go nosing round the stinks of that low laboratory.So I thought all I had written irrelevant, and put it out of my mind.I am greatly grieved to say that it is not irrelevant. It has graduallygrown apparent, to my astounded gaze, that the ruling classes in Englandare still proceeding on the assumption that Prussia is a patternfor the whole world. If parts of my book are nearly nine years oldmost of their principles and proceedings are a great deal older.They can offer us nothing but the same stuffy science, the samebullying bureaucracy and the same terrorism by tenth-rate professorsthat have led the German Empire to its recent conspicuous triumph.For that reason, three years after the war with Prussia, I collectand publish these papers.G. K. C.---/---PART ONETHE FALSE THEORYIWHAT IS EUGENICS ?The wisest thing in the world is to cry out before you are hurt.It is no good to cry out after you are hurt; especially after youare mortally hurt. People talk about the impatience of the populace;but sound historians know that most tyrannies have beenpossible because men moved too late. It is often essentialto resist a tyranny before it exists. It is no answer to say,with a distant optimism, that the scheme is only in the air.A blow from a hatchet can only be parried while it is in the air.There exists to-day a scheme of action, a school of thought,as collective and unmistakable as any of those by whose groupingalone we can make any outline of history. It is as firm a factas the Oxford Movement, or the Puritans of the Long Parliament;or the Jansenists; or the Jesuits. It is a thing that can be pointed out;it is a thing that can be discussed; and it is a thing that can stillbe destroyed. It is called for convenience "Eugenics"; and that itought to be destroyed I propose to prove in the pages that follow.I know that it means very different things to different people;but that is only because evil always takes advantage of ambiguity.I know it is praised with high professions of idealism and benevolence;with silver-tongued rhetoric about purer motherhood and ahappier posterity. But that is only because evil is always flattered,as the Furies were called "The Gracious Ones." I know that it numbersmany disciples whose intentions are entirely innocent and humane;and who would be sincerely astonished at my describing it as I do.But that is only because evil always wins through the strengthof its splendid dupes; and there has in all ages been a disastrousalliance between abnormal innocence and abnormal sin.Of these who are deceived I shall speak of course as we alldo of such instruments; judging them by the good they thinkthey are doing, and not by the evil which they really do.But Eugenics itself does exist for those who have sense enough to seethat ideas exist; and Eugenics itself, in large quantities or small,coming quickly or coming slowly, urged from good motives or bad,applied to a thousand people or applied to three, Eugenics itselfis a thing no more to be bargained about than poisoning.It is not really difficult to sum up the essence of Eugenics:though some of the Eugenists seem to be rather vague about it.The movement consists of two parts: a moral basis, which is commonto all, and a scheme of social application which varies a good deal.For the moral basis, it is obvious that man's ethical responsibilityvaries with his knowledge of consequences. If I were in charge of a baby(like Dr. Johnson in that tower of vision), and the baby was illthrough having eaten the soap, I might possibly send for a doctor.I might be calling him away from much more serious cases,from the bedsides of babies whose diet has been far more deadly;but I should be justified. I could not be expected to know enoughabout his other patients to be obliged (or even entitled) to sacrificeto them the baby for whom I was primarily and directly responsible.Now the Eugenic moral basis is this; that the baby for whom weare primarily and directly responsible is the babe unborn.That is, that we know (or may come to know) enough of certaininevitable tendencies in biology to consider the fruit of somecontemplated union in that direct and clear light of consciencewhich we can now only fix on the other partner in that union.The one duty can conceivably be as definite as or more definitethan the other. The baby that does not exist can be consideredeven before the wife who does. Now it is essential to graspthat this is a comparatively new note in morality. Of course sanepeople always thought the aim of marriage was the procreationof children to the glory of God or according to the plan of Nature;but whether they counted such children as God's reward for serviceor Nature's premium on sanity, they always left the rewardto God or the premium to Nature, as a less definable thing.The only person (and this is the point) towards whom onecould have precise duties was the partner in the process.Directly considering the partner's claims was the nearest onecould get to indirectly considering the claims of posterity.If the women of the harem sang praises of the hero as the Moslemmounted his horse, it was because this was the due of a man;if the Christian knight helped his wife off her horse, it wasbecause this was the due of a woman. Definite and detaileddues of this kind they did not predicate of the babe unborn;regarding him in that agnostic and opportunist light in whichMr. Browdie regarded the hypothetical child of Miss Squeers.Thinking these sex relations healthy, they naturally hopedthey would produce healthy children; but that was all.The Moslem woman doubtless expected Allah to send beautiful sonsto an obedient wife; but she would not have allowed any direct visionof such sons to alter the obedience itself. She would not have said,"I will now be a disobedient wife; as the learned leech informsme that great prophets are often children of disobedient wives."The knight doubtless hoped that the saints would help him tostrong children, if he did all the duties of his station, one ofwhich might be helping his wife off her horse; but he would not haverefrained from doing this because he had read in a book that a courseof falling off horses often resulted in the birth of a genius.Both Moslem and Christian would have thought such speculationsnot only impious but utterly unpractical. I quite agree with them;but that is not the point here.The point here is that a new school believes Eugenics against Ethics.And it is proved by one familiar fact: that the heroismsof history are actually the crimes of Eugenics. The Eugenists'books and articles are full of suggestions that non-eugenicunions should and may come to be regarded as we regard sins;that we should really feel that marrying an invalid is a kind ofcruelty to children. But history is full of the praises of peoplewho have held sacred such ties to invalids; of cases like those ofColonel Hutchinson and Sir William Temples, who remained faithfulto betrothals when beauty and health had been apparently blasted.And though the illnesses of Dorothy Osborne and Mrs. Hutchinsonmay not fall under the Eugenic speculations (I do not know),it is obvious that they might have done so; and certainly it wouldnot have made any difference to men's m...
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