PREPOTENCY IN CHARACTERS. 57 



generation this liability to reversion lessens, as the 

 acquired character becomes more firmly fixed. Thus 

 with every transmission a character becomes more 

 firmly fixed ; but to secure such repeated transmission 

 of a new character, it is necessary that each genera- 

 tion should live under conditions very slightly re- 

 moved from those under which the character was 

 originally acquired, and also, that for a time at least 

 there should be no "crossing;" for, with a changed 

 environment, or with a distinct "cross," there will 

 be reversion, and the character will be lost. Hence 

 the character of long descent is the result, not alone 

 of " in and in " breeding, but of this, carried on in an 

 environment very similar to that in which the char- 

 acter first made its appearance. 



The peculiar mental character of the Hebrew, of 

 which we have spoken, may here be taken as an 

 example. It was, in the first place, the outcome of a 

 certain condition of environment, that is, the pecu- 

 liar mode of life followed. Then it was deepened and 

 strengthened, given a prepotency, by intermarriage 

 with other individuals who had existed in the same 

 environment and who had also acquired the character ; 

 and it has been preserved and fixed in the race by 

 continued intermarriage and by a continuance of the 

 environment which first called it into existence, viz., 

 the mode of life. 



So in every individual, or rather in every family, 

 there are certain characters which stand out pro- 

 minently amongst the myriads of others inherited, 



