NOT GUILTY:
A DEFENCE OF THE BOTTOM DOG
By Robert Blatchford
NEW YORK: BONI AND LIVERIGHT: 1918
Dedicated to my Old Friend & Fellow Worker W.T. WILKINSON
CONTENTS
THE AUTHOR'S APOLOGY
CHAPTER ONE — THE LAWS OF GOD
CHAPTER TWO — THE LAWS OF MAN
CHAPTER THREE — WHERE DO OUR NATURES COME FROM?
CHAPTER FOUR — THE BEGINNINGS OF MORALS
CHAPTER FIVE — THE ANCESTRAL STRUGGLE WITHIN US
CHAPTER SIX — ENVIRONMENT
CHAPTER SEVEN — HOW HEREDITY AND ENVIRONMENT WORK
CHAPTER EIGHT — GOOD AND BAD SURROUNDINGS
CHAPTER NINE — THE ORIGIN OF CONSCIENCE
CHAPTER TEN — FREE WILL
CHAPTER ELEVEN — SELF-CONTROL
CHAPTER TWELVE — GUILTY OR NOT GUILTY?
CHAPTER THIRTEEN — THE FAILURE OF PUNISHMENT
CHAPTER FOURTEEN — SOME OBJECTIONS ANSWERED
CHAPTER FIFTEEN — THE DEFENCE OF THE BOTTOM DOG
THE AUTHOR'S APOLOGY
THIS is not a stiff and learned work, written by a professor for professors, but a human book, written in humanity's behalf by a man, for men and women.
I shall not fret you with strange and stilted language, nor weary you with tedious and irksome science, nor gall you with far-fetched theories, nor waste your time in any vain word-twisting nor splitting of hairs.
A plain-dealing man, speaking frankly and simply to honest and plain-dealing readers, I shall trust to common sense and common knowledge and common English to make my meaning clear.
I have been warned that it is easier to write a book on such a theme as this than to get people to read it when written. But I am hopeful, and my hope springs from the living interest and deep significance of the subject.
For in defending the Bottom Dog I do not deal with hard science only; but with the dearest faiths, the oldest wrongs, and the most awful relationships of the great human family, for whose good I strive, and to whose judgment I appeal.
Knowing, as I do, how the hard-working and hard-playing public shun laborious thinking and serious writing, and how they hate to have their ease disturbed or their prejudices handled rudely, I still make bold to undertake this task, because of the vital nature of the problems I shall probe.
The case for the Bottom Dog should touch the public heart to the quick, for it affects the truth of our religions, the justice of our laws, and the destinies of our children and our children's; children.