The mollusk neglected nerve and muscle. But the
scholar may, and often does, cultivate the brain at the expense of
the rest of the body until he and his descendants suffer, and the
family becomes extinct.
The young men of the nobility of wealth, birth, and fashion usually
marry heiresses, if they can. But only in families of enormous
wealth can there be more than one or two heiresses in the same
generation. She has very probably inherited a portion of her wealth
from one or more extinct branches of the family. Moreover, not to
speak of other factors, the labor and anxiety which have been
essential to the accumulation and preservation of these great
fortunes, or the mode of life which has accompanied their use or
abuse, tend to diminish the number of children. Heiresses to very
large fortunes usually therefore belong to families which are
tending to sterility. And this has very probably been no unimportant
factor in the extinction of "noble" families.
A sound body contains many organs, all of which must be sound. And
in a sound mind there is an even greater number of faculties, all of
which must be kept at a high grade of efficiency. Man is a
marvellously complex being, and more in danger of a narrow and
one-sided development than any lower animal. And it is very easy for
a certain grade or class of society, or for a whole race, to become
so specialized, by the cultivation of only one set of faculties as
to altogether prevent its giving birth to a complete humanity.
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