Gilbert Keith Chesterton

Eugenics and Other Evils Gilbert Keith Chesterton

I PUBLISH these essays at the present time for a particular reason connected with the present situation; a reason which I should like briefly to emphasise and make clear. Though most of the conclusions, especially towards the end, are conceived with reference to recent events, the actual bulk of preliminary notes about the science of Eugenics were written before the war. It was a time when this theme was the topic of the hour; when eugenic babies (not visibly very distinguishable from other babies) sprawled all over the illustrated papers; when the evolutionary fancy of Nietzsche was the new cry among the intellectuals; and when Mr. Bernard Shaw and others were considering the idea that to breed a man like a cart-horse was the true way to attain that higher civilisation, of intellectual magnanimity and sympathetic insight, which may be found in cart-hors~s. It may therefore appear that I took the opinion too contIoversially, and it seems to me that I sometimes took i

Table of Contents

CONTENTS; PART I; The False Theory; CHAPTER I'AC; E; I WHAT IS EUGENICS? ? 3; 2 THE FIRST OBSTACLES 12; 3 THE ANARCHY FROM ABOVE 22; 4 THE LUNATIC AND THE LAW 31; 5 THE FLYING AUTHORITY 46; 6 THE UNANSWERED CHALLENGE 61; 7 THE ESTABLISHED CHURCH OF DOUBT 73; 8 A SUMMARY OF A FALSE THEORY 82; PART II; The Real Aim; I THE IMPOTENCE OF IMPENITENCE 91; 2 TRUE HISTORY OF A TRAMP lor; 3 TRUE HISTORY OF A EUGENIST ? 114; 4 THE VENGEANCE OF THE FLESH 126; 5 THE MEANNESS OF THE MOTIVE 136; 6 THE ECLIPSE OF LIBERTY ? 148; 7 THE TRANSFORMATION OF SOCIALISM ? 159; 8 THE END OF THE H0tJfiEHOLD GODS ? 169; 9 A SHORT CHAPTER 180

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