VARIATIONS. 29 



although all persons are thus variations from the 

 normal stock because of the action of the environment, 

 it is not necessary to look upon them as such. For 

 all practical purposes the average of the healthy mass 

 may be taken as the normal standard. Practically 

 these finer variations are of no moment, and having 

 recognised their existence and cause, we may pass on 

 to the consideration of the more gross. It is only in 

 those cases in which the individual has strayed so far 

 from the normal as to be " out of the common " that 

 we are asked to look upon him as a variation, and 

 consider whether he is to be classed as physiological 

 or pathological whether he is on the way to a higher 

 development, or on the down path to extinction. 



This action of the environment upon the individual 

 has not been given the attention it deserves in this 

 connection. Some writers refuse to recognise it as 

 a cause of variation, believing that its action affects 

 the individual only slightly, and does not modify the 

 family type through him ; but we shall find, upon 

 inquiry, that it is one of the most potent influences at 

 work in the changing of family and racial types. 



Man, as we know him, is a creature of circum- 

 stances ; he is moulded by his surroundings. His con- 

 dition of mind and body, in whatever position we find 

 him, is the result of the action of the environment 

 upon him, and as his surroundings are ever changing, so 

 is he ever changing with them. No man is mentally, 

 morally, or physically exactly what he was even a 

 year ago, and no one will aver that this change is not 



