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Orga7iic Nature s Riddle 327 



ces of such inheritance in human beings, and as regards 



e lower animals, the barking of dogs may be taken as an 



tance of a habit thus perpetuated. In fact ' habit,' when 



mherited, so simulates instinct, that their confusion is far 



om surprising. There is, however, this radical difference 



tween them: 'habit' enables an agent to repeat with 



facility and precision an act which has been done before, 



Iut 'instinct' determines with precision the first perform- 

 pce of such act. Keferring instinct to habit but temporarily 

 Sieves the difficulty of those who object to instinct, by 

 j.)Utting it a step back. It is impossible to beheve that 

 any of the progenitors of an infant of to-day first acquired, 

 during his or her lifetime, the habit of sucking, or that the 

 habits of neuter insects thus arose. But after all, if we could 

 explain ' instinct ' by ' habit,' should we thereby make the 

 phenomena less mysterious ? ' Habit ' is due to an internal 

 spontaneity of living things. A Hving thing no doubt re- 

 quires some internal sohcitation, in order that it should move, 

 but when it does move that movement is its own. All living 

 organisms tend to act. With them action is not only their 

 nature, 'tis a want; and, within limits, their powers and 

 energies increase with action, and diminish and finally perish 

 through repose. The power of generating any 'habit,' lies 

 in the very first act of the kind an organism performs, and 

 it is only the first act which owes nothing to habit. If such 

 were not the case, an act might be performed a thousand 

 times and yet not generate habit. It is this mysterious 

 internal active tendency which distinguishes all living 

 organisms from inorganic bodies. The latter tend simply 

 to persist as they are, and have no relations with the past 

 or the future. They have, therefore, no relations with time 

 at aU — for the actual present ever evades us. Organisms, on 

 the other hand, which are permanently more or less changed, 

 through habit, by every new motion and sensation, have 



