Many books have been written on this, but one fallacy vitiates them all. The observers have not observed the criminal in the making but when made. They have assumed the criminal to be of a race apart, and so founded their house upon the sand. Lombroso went so far as to lay down certain stigmata that inferred a criminal disposition. The stigmata have been shown to be universal, and there is no such thing as a "criminal disposition." If there be other qualities that do differentiate the criminal from the normal man, they are not innate. That those born crippled in some way frequently become criminals is no exception; it denotes no criminal disposition. But the cripple is handicapped in the struggle for life. He is cut off from the many pleasures of work and play, of love and children, which his fellows have. He is sensitive and he is jeered at and despised. Is it any wonder that under such circumstances he becomes sometimes embittered? A cripple is set apart from his fellow-men. There are for him but two alternatives--to be a saint or a criminal. Love and care and training will make him a saint; neglect too often makes him a criminal. But to whom the blame for the latter? Not to him. Connected with this theory is the supposition that criminality is hereditary. There are few subjects on which so much "scientific" nonsense is talked and written as this of heredity. Not very much is known of it as regards plants, less of animals, and almost nothing as regards humanity. Furthermore, the experience gained in plants and animals is useless as regards humanity. Evolution in humanity tends to greater brain power, but all cultivation in animals and plants has tended to destroy brain power and even adaptability. To read books on heredity is to read a mass of suppositions and hazardous inductions where most of the facts are negative and the exceptions are positive. There is nothing so easy and nothing so fatal as this tendency to attribute to heredity what is due to training, or want of training. It excuses supineness in Governments and professions. Here is what John Stuart Mill, a profound thinker, thought of this facile recourse to heredity as an excuse: "Of all vulgar methods of escape from the effects of social and moral influences on the mind, the most vulgar is that of attributing the diversions of conduct and character to inherent natural differences."