THE DANGERS OF SOCIALISTIC 

 LEGISLATION 



By CHARLES WALKER, D.Sc, M.R.CS., L.R.C.P. 



No living organism, either animal or plant, is exactly like any 

 other living organism, no matter how near the relationship may 

 be : in a litter of collie pups, no individual is exactly like either 

 of its parents ; nor are two individuals in the same litter exactly 

 alike. This is equally true of similar parts of the same organism : 

 no two leaves of an oak tree are exactly alike. Even when we 

 go down to the units of living matter, the cells, we find that no 

 two cells, even those forming parts of the same tissue or organ, 

 are ever exactly alike. It is then obvious that variability is a 

 common property of all living matter. Another property of 

 living matter, also universal, is that when organisms multiply or 

 produce young they produce organisms like themselves. Thus, 

 in spite of the differences already referred to in the case of a 

 litter of collie pups, the pups will be far more like each other 

 and like their parents than they will be like bulldogs or terriers. 

 This similarity extends to parts of organisms. An oak leaf, 

 though never exactly the same as other oak leaves, is far more 

 like them than are the leaves of any other kind of plant ; a liver 

 cell, though never exactly the same as other liver cells, is 

 incomparably more so than is any other kind of cell. 



All this must be so readily realised by any one, even though 

 his knowledge and experience be of the slightest ; it is all so 

 easy of demonstration : that, in drawing attention to it, one risks 

 being classed among the apostles of the obvious. What 

 is perhaps not so obvious is that the evolution of living 

 organisms, animals and plants, is entirely dependent upon these 

 two properties of living matter. It is by the action of the 

 environment upon them that new characters, new species and 

 genera, the almost innumerable varieties of animals and plants 

 now existing in the world, have been produced. Of course, the 

 beginning must have been in some primitive form of living 



matter of which we have as yet no knowledge but it is easy to 



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