Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 83.djvu/38

34 biological significance as the blue-eyed or long-headed races; they are properly called biotypes. If some of these biotypes do not persist for more than a few generations it is because of the constant cross-breeding that is going on between biotypes. When a blue-eyed Irish girl marries a south Italian the children are all brown-eyed—the potential blue-eyed biotype is brought to an end by hybridization. So when a great color artist marries a woman who belongs to a non-artistic family the children may not belong to the artistic biotype; but, under appropriate matings, the characteristic of the biotype may reappear in later generations.

The objection is raised to this view that it overlooks the importance of opportunity in determining the vocation in which one finds success. This objection is founded on the fundamental theory that all men have equal capacities for all things and the reason why one person succeeds in one occupation and another in a different occupation is because they have different opportunities. And the objection vanishes when this theory falls. A year in a Berlin conservatory of music would be a great opportunity for some people; but not for me. How often is the dearest wish of a man to have his son take up the profession in which he himself has succeeded frustrated by the son's entire lack of taste or capacity for such a profession. "Opportunity" assumes an innate capacity for taking advantage of it. Hence, those who have had a "superior opportunity" must have had a germ plasm specially adapted thereto. Those who regret a lack of early opportunities really (within limits) regret their inability to respond more adequately to such stimuli—such culture—as came to them. Now, "all men" are born into thousands of distinct biotypes and what is true of those of one biotype is not true of others. A single standard "before the law" is as unbiological as it is cruel.

Consideration of the inequalities of persons "before the law" involves an examination of the foundations of law and society. Again and again, in various parts of the world, men have come together in communal life for physical and moral support, responding to a gregarious instinct. A leader is selected to enforce these communal customs that past experiences have proved to be favorable to the community. Moral law is merely this: behavior that is favorable for the specific community is "good"; behavior that is harmful for the community is "bad." Good and bad thus refer to conduct which is judged in its relation to the experiences, traditions and ideals of the given community.

Now, conduct is reaction to a stimulus; what the reaction shall be depends not only on the stimulus, but also on the nature of the reacting protoplasm; particularly, in man, of the senso-neuro-muscular complex. While in the young the relation of stimulus to reaction is relatively simple, during development there appears, most markedly in gregarious