mind. He determines to prove all things for himself on the touchstone of his own sagacity. Sometimes a whole community begins to question the authority of its manners and customs, its laws and institutions. Some great national perplexity arises, and the old ways of life are proved insufficient. The gradual growth and the slow progress of moralisation begin to suggest that the old beliefs are inadequate and the old customs unworthy. But even when the individual criticises his environment most severely, he criticises it because he is its own child. The society really uses him to criticise itself. The great reformer is always a thorough child of his time. It is precisely because his environment has saturated him so completely that he turns upon it in criticism.
It follows that environment is potent to counteract or encourage the hereditary tendencies which every child possesses, and whose persistence has been already illustrated. We all know how influential the environment is in corrupting good tendencies. It is a hackneyed commonplace, yet an unhappy truth, that the environment of the slum slowly but surely weakens the mental and moral strength of nearly all who enter it. Perhaps our thoughts are apt to dwell too much on this drab aspect of the operation of environment. But on the other side of the shield we have a brighter picture, and one that is no less true. Environment can exert a mighty power in restraining and repressing evil proclivities, and eliciting and confirming tendencies to good. "The records of charitable societies show that about 85 per cent, of the children of
