VIRILE SENTIMENT 59 



the offspring may be a mosaic of the two characters 

 of the parents. We may call this " mosaic, par- 

 ticulate, or poecilodynamous inheritance." 



I am not concerned now in discussing these types 

 of inheritance, for it is to be observed they are all 

 based upon the visible body characters. They are 

 descriptive of the somatic features only in inheritance. 

 My present line of enquiry will deal with somatic 

 or body characters as incidental but still necessary 

 features of consideration. It is with the gametic 

 or sex-cell characters, which are, of course, invisible 

 to us until they are manifested in the body cells, 

 that we shall be essentially concerned. And I would 

 like you to try and form a mental picture for yourself 

 of an individual as a compound made up of a large 

 number of sex-cells, which are surrounded by body 

 cells, but which are in a sense independent of them. 

 The body cells are the perishable cells ; they live our 

 life for us, and then die. But the sex-cells, in a sense, 

 are the immortal cells, for they carry on our characters 

 from the generation in which we live to all those which 

 succeed us. Whatever the body cells may do, there 

 is no evidence to show that the sex-cells respond to 

 environmental influences, in the sense that their 

 innate qualities can be altered. Indeed, their stability 

 is a matter of vital importance, for without it there 

 could not exist species that, throughout long periods 

 of time and through a wide range of geographical 

 distribution, retain their characters unaltered. There 

 could be no survival of the fittest, if the qualities 

 which made a race the fittest were not stable and, 

 therefore, persistent. 



