Page:George Archdall Reid 1896 The present evolution of man.djvu/356

344 to a large and earnest section of the community, and doubtless it will be said, especially by those who have not taken the trouble to read this work, that I am an advocate of intemperance, and probably—by a transition easy to a certain order of intellect—that I am intemperate myself. The problem must be faced, however; it is a great matter, and big with fate; a step in the wrong direction may result in untold evil. It is true that races differ vastly in various respects, among others in the intensity with which they crave for drunkenness; and this latter difference, like all other differences, must be due to a process of evolution in one direction or another; either from a condition in which the craving was great towards a condition in which it is less, or else from a condition in which the craving was little, or practically non-existent, towards a condition in which it is great. The popular belief is that the racial use of alcohol results in ever-increasing racial intemperance; but the fact certainly is that races which have had the most extended experience of the poison are the most temperate; whereas all primitive peoples who have had no experience of alcohol or any other narcotic, crave for it intensely, and if they have the opportunity, poison themselves with it. Clearly the direction of the evolution has been from a greater craving towards a lesser, and no probable cause for it can be imagined except Alcoholic Selection, except the survival of the fittest in relation to alcohol, i.e. the survival, in generation after generation, during which alcohol was manufactured in stronger and stronger, in more and more poisonous solutions, of those individuals who craved least for it, and the elimination of those who craved most for it.

It is true also as regards evolution in general, that, whenever the stringency of selection is relaxed, any race which has undergone evolution immediately begins