Page:An introduction to ethics.djvu/42

 them, traced through seven generations, were criminals and paupers. Of the total number of men, less than 20 were skilled workmen, and of these 10 learned their trades in the State prisons. But it is not only the pure black strain that persists in this way. A study of the descendants of Jonathan Edwards shows that of the 1400 of them with regard to whom information was available, not a single one was a criminal or pauper, while the family had adorned every department of learning and activity in the United States.

These and similar studies make perfectly clear the remarkable persistence of mental and moral characteristics from one generation to the next. There can be no doubt that they do persist. But the real question is, Are these characteristics really inherited? On the whole it seems probable that precise mental and moral qualities are not inherited like physical characteristics. Because certain mental and moral characteristics persist from one generation to another, it does not follow that they are inherited. They may simply be developed anew in each generation under the influence of the early environment. The "Jukes" all grew up in unfavourable environments, while the members of the Edwards family all enjoyed good surroundings in their early days. In most cases it is to the influence of the early home environment rather than to that of heredity that the persistence of precise mental and moral characteristics should be ascribed.

Yet it is certain that we can and do inherit tendencies and capacities in the mental and moral