The intermarriage of relations / by Nathan Allen.

  • Allen, Nathan, 1813-1889.
Date:
1869
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The intermarriage of relations / by Nathan Allen. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    marriages disastrous to their issue; nor by what means she avoids these unfortunate results by rendering many such unions fruitless. We must leave the develop- ment of this subject to the future physiologist; if, in- deed, the sea of human knowledge shall ever extend its limits in this direction.” Connected with the great law of population, we think some light may be thrown upon this obscure and complicated question. Dr. Spurzheim, who had long been a careful ob- server in Europe, made this remark in his last lecture delivered in Boston just before his death (1832): “ Among the royal families of Europe, who had mar- ried in and in, there is now scarcely one of their de- scendants who can write a page of consecutive sound sense on any scientific, literary, or moral subject.” Dr. Charles Caldwell, of Kentucky (lately de- ceased), one of the most profound lecturers and writers on physiology that this or any other country ever pro- duced, says : “ One source of human deterioration is a long series of family marriages. Be the cause what it may, both history and observation testify to the fact that the issue of marriages between parties related by consanguinity degenerate. They become enfeebled in time, both mentally and corporally. This practice, which is fostered by the false pride of rank, has re- duced almost to dwarfishness the nobility of several nations, especially of Portugal. It has likewise aided not a little, in not only deteriorating, but nearly ex- tinguishing most of the royal families of Europe. This cause is strengthened and rendered more impres- sive by the fact that the ancestors of these families were the real proceres or natural nobles of the land; men pe- culiarly distinguished in their day as well for corpo- real stature, strength, and comeliness, as for mental ex-