An Introduction to a Biology 



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The mantle of A falls upon B " means that B is the 

 next source through which what flowed through A will 

 flow out. 



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There can be no laws of heredity : least of all of here- 

 ditary genius. Mendelian characters may not be free, but 

 mental ones probably are, and the production of genius 



must be. 



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Reason why facts of Biology are so speciaHsed — the 

 desire to discover something new, e.g. description of new 

 species. But genius consists not in telling you something 

 nobody knew, but something everyone knows. 



Originality is the attribute of a man — like Beethoven — 

 who is an instrument in the hands of a power stronger than 

 himself, the spring through which a message is dehvered. 

 It is the attribute of the work of the man or of the man 

 himself (for in the case of great men the man and his work 

 are one) who expresses for mankind what they have known all 

 along so deep in their hearts that they did not know they 

 knew it. Originality is the attribute of those men who are 

 born with, the gift which they hand on to mankind. 



But in current parlance the words " original " and 

 *' originality " mean the very opposite of this. Originality 

 is taken to be the doing of something new, or dificrent from 

 the ways in which it has been done. " Original research " 

 means working in a new field and bringing to light facts 

 which have not been discovered before. It ought to mean 

 work which searches again into origins. 



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Life has got into the very hands least fitted to deal vdth 

 her — into those of glum octogenarians fondling dry bones 

 with their withered hands. 



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