426 Eimer on Growth and Inheritance 



devoted to a consideration of acquired characters. The 

 fifth describes what the author beUeves to be the effects 

 of the disuse of organs and of indiscriminate breeding. In 

 the sixth, ' mental faculties as acquired and inherited 

 characters' are considered. The seventh chapter treats of 

 the ' evolution of the living world as the result of function : 

 and in the eighth and last, an examination of ' the idea of 

 Organic Growth ' leads to his conclusion. 



Before examining these chapters seriathn, it may be well 

 — in order to make plain what is the mental standpoint from 

 which he has set forth to contemplate the living world about 

 him — if we begin with an examination of his ' conclusion.* 

 We shall thus also be enabled to gain a fuller knowledge 

 of this ' standpoint ' if we likewise briefly review a popular 

 lecture of his, here given as an appendix, and entitled, ' On 

 the Idea of the Individual in the Animal Kingdom.' 



The conclusion at which he arrives ^ may be thus 

 summarised. One principle of unity runs through the 

 whole organic world, and is essentially the same in the 

 vital manifestations of the lowest alga and the highest 

 reflections of the mind of man. Any one, he tells us, who 

 completely renders allegiance to his doctrine and 



* rejects everything which contradicts this principle, cannot help 

 admitting that in truth, as I [Eimer] assert, the ultimate origin of 

 the various kinships in the animal and vegetable kingdom is to be 

 traced to individual differences, and that the differences between the 

 former, like the latter, must be essentially determined by external 

 conditions, by the modifications of organic growth.' 



Thus we have given us the keynote of the symphony to 

 which we will shortly give an ear. One expression of 

 Professor Elmer's, however, must by no means be passed 

 over. He tells us - it is a ' self-evident truth ' that ' if 

 species are only a collection of individnals, and genera a 



r. 409. -• P. 410. The italics are ours. 



