BEN TILLETT ON CHARACTER AND ENVIRONMENT.

Otago Witness, Issue 2286, 23 December 1897, Page 42

BEN TILLETT ON CHARACTER AND ENVIRONMENT.

By. Dinornis.

In his address at the Choral Hall last Friday evening Mr Tillett dealt with the subject of ''Character and Environment," an aspect of biological science which concerns itself with the ir,flaence of surroundings upon living things. To those interested in this branch of science nothing is more obvious than that natural forces of every, kind act aud react upon human beings just as they do upon every kind of living thing, both plant, and animal. There may be differences of degree in this — of differences of kind there are none whatever. Therefore, in defining bis position the lecturer hud no difficult task to perform. From wrong environments, he practically declared, it would be absurd to expect right results. Set one plant La good soil, amid fresh air and sunlight:, and put its sister plant amid the darkness of a cellar, and you get totally different result*. The one will grow and thrive, throw oat blossoms of beauty and produce fruit -in abundance, which, amid favourable environment, will carry its healthy progeny abroad to conquer the world ; the other and less fortunate plant may continue to live -and grow in a way, may even bear flowers and fruit; but its efforts will be of a sadly pony kind, and its progeny will be far from likely to prevail" in the struggle even for a decent living. This is good, everyday science, and in an ordinary way such facts are noted more or less thiokingly by almost everyone.

From facts of tbis kind Mr Tillett proceeded to argae that the dwel'ers in slams are in the position of the plant in the cellar; that the frightfully high death rate among the infant population of slams is especially due to the fearfully bad environment into which the unhappy infants are born. The exitftenco of slums he ascribed to oar competitive system and to vicious methods of exploiting industry generally, and ia language of exceeding passionatenesa and force denounced- the sweater and all his tribe. No one could fail to be profoundly moved by his lurid word pictures of old-world slums, certainly not mjself, having lived in some of them for brief periods and knowing that the most vivid description can never outdo the reality.

It woul i indeed be folly to contend that from the foetid, overcrowded slums one may confidently look for the flower of the human race to emerge. It is reasonable Also to expect excellent results from those favoured, regions. wherein the resources of art, science,' ru-edicine, and sanitation are at hand ia superabundance. ' Not that faultless results are always got then, but the lecturer "held," that bo it was. From such "premises, then, Mr Tillett proceeded to make the rather. toOsweeping statement' that all the evil which embitters human, life is directly traceable to the irifluence of wrong environment. Now, leaving aside consideration of what the theologian may have to say about his theory of evil, it is hardly possible to let a wild declaration of tbis sort paa3 unnoticed. Mr Tillett's simple faith in bis own explanation of the " origin of evil " is accompanied by a belief, equally simple, that all tbis wrong can be turned to right by means of legislation. Strangely, i he quite ignores certain considerations that should ba very evident to anyone who has looked into the subject of environment versus organism. L*ke many another wouldbe social reformer he is apt to over- ride important facts and to bring, into prominence only such others as appear favourable to his contention. This is commonly done upon the, propagandist platform, whatever the subject of the propaganda happens to be. With the unthinking, and with those etronglf influenced by the speaker's heated oratory, this Ijp-sided method of treatment is likely to. pass unnoticed. Yet it' is an entirely faulty mode of dealing with any, especially with an ' abstru.se, scientific subject. The whole ques-i tion.of the effect of environment upon livingbeings is deoidediy of the most abstruse kind, and in fact many of the Keenestminded biologists are etgiged upon this extremely unsettled problem at the present, day. Bat there are other influences besides those of environment which bear upon and hold us in their grasp. How the lecturer could have so much to say about environment and nothing at all to say about Ti&rt&ity is a thing that greatly surprised me. Whatever else they may disagree about, biologists everywhere uphold the vast importance of heredity. Heredity, not environment, is the most potent influence in ouc lives and in that •of all living things. The best environment that ever was cannot make us essentially different from what we were born. Heredity, or " the organic relation between successive generations," determines what we are as inevitably as Fate ; in fact, it is Fate. Science gives no sanction to the hope that even the most favourable environment can to any great degree alter oar life legacies through heredity.

Children are truly " chips of the old block " always — not of the parental merely, but of the ancestral block principally. Take a child from a slum dwelling and have it, reared in a Belgravian mansion. Ib may grow up finely and equal to anyj it may turn out a genius even, though geniusoa do not frequently have Belgravia for a birthplace. Mr Tillett would say the new environment had wrought the miracle. Bat let as go Blow. Take another child and do the best you can for him also. As like as not he may turn out a perfect wastrel— nothing to be wondered at seeing how many born and reared in palaces turn, oat worthless without slum influence at all. This kind of thing is common amid the best as- amid the worst surrounding*, and it is unhappily as common to blameless parents as to wrong-doing ones.

Now, the why and the wherefore of this is. teo fine a matter to tackle at the tail end of the present scribble, bat I am quite willing to rotorntoifett oallajl upon, Wiu one tadj-

vidual should be blessed and another damned through heredity seems a very inexplicable matter, bnt.lhe most ordinary study of pre-sent-day biology makes it pretty plain that it is what always happens. Nature, working in every raoe, seeks to come at a mean ; we take the mean for granted, and only take stock of those, who on the one side are extra blessed in inheritance, or those who in the other are as grievously enrsed.

My remarks are to be taken merely as * protest-, not as an attempt at' exposition, bob have <re not a graat and pathetic illustration of what I claim in the children of our Maori schools. The bright, sturdy little youngster*, who in their earlier yaars " are, if anything; quicker than their European competitors,"from the age of 10 or 12 fall gradually away, until soon they are left hopelessly oat of the race. It is sad, but it is inevitable find it is heredity. To expect that a raca with the antecedents of the Maori could ever live in civilised competition with a race which blossoms out in a Shakespeare, a Darwin, a Barns, or a X lvin is to expect the impossible. Eveiy race is improvable, but racial improvement depends to a very great extent upon deeper-lying causes than those found in environment. Science has made that evident, and the other most important and marvellous fact that changes wrought upon the individual by environment are rarely, if .at all, passed on to future generations. Thir, as it ought to be, is a great consolation to those of us who feel the stress of inferior and harmful environment. ' Indeed, in my opinion, the moat beautiful demonstration of modern science is that which shows as how every child is a fresh* start f6r the raca.

There are several aspects of Mr Tillett'* address to whioh I will briefly allude. Like himself, I most earnestly desire to see the end, once and for all, of every slum in existence. Having been to some slight extent connected with those who have during recent years turned some of the worst oldcountry slums into pleasantly wholesome dwellings, I am not without some practical. | knowledge of the necessities of the case. It cartainly is justifiable to maintain that the governing and influential classes generally are brutally and selfishly ignorant and apathetic. Were they to attack the question in a right spirit the last vestige of slumdom. could be made to disappear in a few brief years, and nobody be a psnny the worse either, while a vast number of really excellent and deserving folk would be undoubtedly i raised in the social scale. Slum dwellers are | not so fearfully lapsed into misery in every instance as those who have never seen a slam may imagine. When I say that some of the most genuinely good folk I have ev«r met bava been dwellers in Blums, I ntter no I exaggeration. Indeed, it would be no exaggeration to claim that amid slums sociability is much more ' truly developed than almost anywhere else. Where elie, indatd, ia true sociability to be found ? Not, surely, amid the surrounding* of the middle-class Briton, with his overwhelming deßir«* to get away from contac 1 ; wi«h folk whose worst fault is that they are very like himself,. Not^ in " Saciet,y,"'with a cap S — to took there for sociability would be most contemptibly silly. .Not" even, if the- .truth must be told, among the trim villas of Dunecftn towni wherein .each man bas such art amazing reverence for his .own side ofc'fche garden wall, but no regard at all for what lies beyond it. For my own psrfc, [ wonld like to say a word for the slum dweller afl. a soeUl ■ examplar — a good word it would need to be, too. A faw of the happiest months «ot my life were spent in a slum, which I shall always remember with affection for the sweet songs of one of the dwellers, the readings in poetry and little dips in philosophy which occupied parts of our evening?, and among oth«r things for the clever, hearty housewifery which kept us in excellent condition, even in, a slum. I do not share Mr Tillett's faith in political remedies. My friends are always telling me I am too soepticil in every way, bat scepticism grows on the bashes where I come from. That is why I cannot' bring myself to believe in politicians, and the more I see of them the less I believe in -them — a lot of peddling, muddle-headed, -verbose ignoramuses — very likely they to solve this great sociological problem ! No, no ; let Mr Tillett try to convert the scientific workers; the artists, who know beauty from' ugliness ; the bright-minded literary men, with Sir W. Besant at their head ; the naturalists particularly, who know the- intimate facts of the case, and ha may succeed in doinrg wonderful things, bat with politicians in this instance — never.

Even when improved environments have been " found " for people, the experiment has uotr usually turned out well. I mayerterss an instance Saltairo, the model town built by the late Sir Titus Salt In Yorkshire' for- his workpeople. This Boglish community was provided with a very desirable environment, greatly better than that from which they were lifted. They got a fresh start in a model town, with all favonrab'e conditions tied to their heads ; they had the chief thing o&all, fixity of employment. Their environment included model detached dwellings with gardens, &j., all according to modern ideal. They had recreative diversion suited to all, were provided with reading rooms, institutions for various educative purposes, fee. They had no beershops, but everything else an Englishman could reasonably covert they had for their use. Tne town was built upon a specially-selected site adapted to drainage, maximum sunlight, and so on. Bat Saltairo ' has not proved a success ; its denizens »r« probably worse than they were ; their best possessions are neglected, the model dwellings are now in a far from model state, and the community as a whole is as thoroughly discontented a one as there- is in Britain. But I hope it will not ba believed that I • Beck to argue against anything that tends to I produce improved environment — I am quite aware of the Importance of good surroundings ; bat that does not cause me to baliere that the rich man has a monopoly of them, nor doas it make me forget the immensely greater influence of heredity in the evolution of the raca.