CHANGE IN CHARACTER. 109 



therefore the character which was best fitted * for its 

 environment ultimately survived a wholly different 

 matter. The Bushman, as Mr. Spencer argues, has 

 stronger eye-sight than the European ; but circum- 

 stance, that is, distant danger to be shunned, or food 

 to be secured, did not strengthen his vision ; he, and 

 such progeny as took after him, survived because they 

 had stronger vision than their fellows. The trees on 

 which the giraffe feeds do not elongate its neck and 

 tongue; the giraffe which had the longest neck and 

 longest tongue was fittest to survive. Now change of 

 circumstance, I venture to say, could no more change 

 human ' nerve ' and character in one, or many, genera- 

 tions than, during one or many generations, short trees 

 could shorten a giraffe's neck or tall trees lengthen it. 

 The evolution argument is altogether in favour of the 

 dominant potency of organisation and heredity; for it 

 is improbable that the ' nerve ' and character of 

 many millions of years admit of material change in a 

 single generation. Speaking broadly, and keeping 

 aloof from detail and from psychological refinements, 

 we may look on character as compounded mainly of 

 endowments and propensities. The endowments on 

 natural gifts of nerve lie at the foundation of character :' 

 circumstance and volition can add but little to these 

 and can take but little from them. The propensities 

 comprise the uses, including methods and aims, to 

 which the endowments are put; undoubtedly these 

 are much under the influence of circumstance and 

 volition, but they are based on the endowments which 

 lie behind them. Village Hampdens, mute inglorious 



* The most felicitous phrase of our epoch, "survival of the 

 fittest," we owe to Herbert Spencer. It applies as much to the world 

 of morals as to the world of intellect and feeling and action. 



