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 [uj! LIBRARY 1^1 



VIII 

 OUR FUTURE COURSE 



The views expressed in the preceding pages 

 appeal to me as nothing more than a sound inter- 

 pretation and appHcation of the principles of good 

 biology and common sense to the problems of 

 evolution. It sometimes seems that no position is 

 more difficult to establish, for the careful applica- 

 tion of facts demands the discard of all dogma and 

 controversy of the past in its attempt to reduce all 

 factors dispassionately to their proper places in 

 the greater whole. We have had little but con- 

 troversy in evolution for many decades, yet it has 

 not been especially productive; the same contro- 

 versial treatment is still possible. Controversy is 

 much too likely to breed opinion instead of prog- 

 ress, and progress, at present, is greatly to be 

 desired. 



The outstanding feature of this interpretation of 

 evolutionary processes is the fact that it is neither 

 Darwinian nor Lamarckian nor mutational. I have 

 attempted to show in my first few chapters how 

 utterly impossible it is to separate the factors of 

 environment and heritage in living things, and 

 how illogical it is to debate the relative importance 



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