Page:Six Major Prophets (1917).djvu/248

 of the colleges acts as a practical deterrent of marriage. So by this elaborate and expensive system of examination, competitions, and promotions—which unfortunately is not so inefficient as its occasional mistakes might lead us to think—the university prevents those whom it deems to have the brightest minds from transmitting their mental endowments to posterity. The devil could not have devised a more ingenious scheme for the promotion of mediocrity. Since Oxford has been in existence for about eight hundred years it must have had a considerable influence on the reduction of British genius.

As Schiller points out, any measures to be eugenically effective must apply to the young. The rewards bestowed upon ability are not only frequently misapplied but they are invariably too long delayed. The youthful genius is too often forced to give up having a family or compelled to support it on faith, hope and charity. To this defect in our civilization Schiller has given the apt name of "social hysteresis."

In all the professions (except, perhaps, that of the actress) the young are underpaid, and established reputations are overpaid. It would be eugenically