Searchlights on Health: The Science of EugenicsJefferis, B. G. (Benjamin Grant)
Philosophy
Searchlights on Health: The Science of Eugenics
Jefferis, B. G. (Benjamin Grant)
Eugenics; Hygiene; Marriage; Medicine, Popular; Sexual ethics
6. QUALITIES OF THE MIND.--The Qualities of the mind are perhaps
as much liable to hereditary transmission as bodily configuration.
Memory, intelligence, judgment, imagination, passions, diseases, and
what is usually called genius, are often very markedly traced in the
offspring.--I have known mental impressions forcibly impressed upon
the offspring at the time of conception, as concomitant of some
peculiar eccentricity, idiosyncrasy, morbidness, waywardness,
irritability, or proclivity of either one or both parents.
7. THE PLASTIC BRAIN.--The plastic brain of the foetus is prompt
to receive all impressions. It retains them, and they become the
characteristics of the child and the man. Low spirits, violent
passions, irritability, frivolity, in the pregnant woman, leave
indelible marks on the unborn child.
8. FORMATION OF CHARACTER.--I believe that pre-natal influences may
do as much in the formation of character as all the education that
can come after, and that mothers may, in a measure, "will," what that
influence shall be, and that, as knowledge on the subject increases,
it will be more and more under their control. In that, as in
everything else, things that would be possible with one mother would
not be with another, and measures that would be successful with one
would produce opposite results from the other.
9. A HISTORICAL ILLUSTRATION.--A woman rode side by side with her
soldier husband, and witnessed the drilling of troops for battle. The
scene inspired her with a deep longing to see a battle and share in
the excitements of the conquerors. This was but a few months before
her boy was born, and his name was Napoleon.
10. A MUSICIAN.--The following was reported by Dr. F.W. Moffatt, in
the mother's own language, "When I was first pregnant, I wished
my offspring to be a musician, so, during the period of that
pregnancy, settled my whole mind on music, and attended every musical
entertainment I possibly could. I had my husband, who has a violin, to
play for me by the hour. When the child was born, it was a girl, which
grew and prospered, and finally became an expert musician."
11. MURDEROUS INTENT.--The mother of a young man, who was hung not
long ago, was heard to say: "I tried to get rid of him before he was
born; and, oh, how I wish now that I had succeeded!" She added that it
was the only time she had attempted anything of the sort; but, because
of home troubles, she became desperate, and resolved that her burdens
should not be made any greater. Does it not seem probable that the
murderous intent, even though of short duration, was communicated
to the mind of the child, and resulted in the crime for which he was
hung?
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