In the last chapter we had evidence enough that in human societies, just as in the animal world, a very keen struggle is going on. This struggle is seen on a colossal scale when whole races enter into combat with each other, and success attends the one which is superior in some quality of mind or body, or that is rich in the possession of some machine of war. We have the spectacle of the Eastern king using a captive nation for the construction of irrigation works, or for the building of a temple or a pyramid; or, coming to more modern times, we see the Mexican civilisation destroyed by the Spaniards, or the wholesale extermination of savage races by the British. So, likewise, amongst the individual members of any given community very much the same struggle may be seen, in which the poor are the conquered ones, and the rich the vanquishers in the fight. _Does the Race show Increased Brain Capacity?_ This competition of individuals in our own community has always been one in which brain power has been pitted against brain power, rather than muscle volume against muscle volume, and it is interesting to investigate whether or no, as a result of this struggle, our race has increased its innate intellectual capacity during the historic period, and, furthermore, what changes are likely to take place in the future. Before we can venture to proceed with this investigation, it is necessary at once to separate from each other the question of our innate intellectual activity, and that of our intellectual property. We, in this nineteenth century, are the inheritors of a vast fund of accumulated knowledge--an intellectual property--which is infinitely greater than that possessed by the Greeks at the time of Socrates and Plato, yet I do not think that anyone would venture to assert that an average Englishman of to-day has better brain tissue and corresponding intellectual activity than that which was possessed by an average ancient Greek; indeed, some with Galton would say that the Englishman’s brain power is very inferior. We have always to bear in mind that, owing to our possession of the faculty of language spoken and written, our intellectual property, like our material property in houses, land, etc., has been, and is being, transmitted to us from generation to generation, and that we at the present time are recipients of the accumulations amassed by the restless intellectual activity of our direct and indirect ancestors. We cannot, therefore, determine whether we are increasing in our intellectual activity by the amount of knowledge we possess, and we must seek some other evidence.