before the problem will be fully cleared up.
Alcohol has been in use in parts of the world for many centuries; it was common in the Orient before the beginning of historical knowledge. Now if its use by man impairs the germ-plasm, then it seems obvious that the child of one who uses alcohol to a degree sufficient to impair his germ-plasm will tend to be born inferior to his parent. If that child himself is alcoholic, his own offspring will suffer still more, since they must carry the burden of two generations of impairment. Continuing this line of reasoning over a number of generations, in a race where alcohol is freely used by most of the population, one seems unable to escape from the conclusion that the effects of this racial poison, if it be such, must necessarily be cumulative. The damage done to the race must increase in each generation. If the deterioration of the race could be measured, it might even be found to grow in a series of figures representing arithmetical progression.
It seems impossible, with such a state of affairs, that a race in which alcohol was widely used for a long period of time, could avoid extinction. At any rate, the races which have used alcohol longest ought to show great degeneracy—unless there be some regenerative process at work constantly counteracting this cumulative effect of the racial poison in impairing the germ-plasm.
Such a proposition at once demands an appeal to history. What is found in examination of the races that have used alcohol the longest? Have they undergone a progressive physical degeneracy, as should be expected?
By no means. In this particular respect they seem to have become stronger rather than weaker, as time went on; that is, they have been less and less injured by alcohol in each century, as far as can be told. Examination of the history of nations which are now comparatively