INERTIA AS RELATED TO HEREDITY 81 



here what some have called molecular friction and 

 others molecular inertia. In the famous Belfast 

 address,* he said (amongst other things that proved 

 more controversial), "These pre-determined internal 

 relations f are independent of the experiences of the 

 individual." 



Just as there are vestigial organs, so too, there 

 may be vestigial metabolisms. That the exer- 

 tion of uric acid in the mammal is such a func- 

 tional relic was the view of the late Sir Wm. 

 Roberts. It has been adversely criticised lately 

 in " Recent Advances in Physiology and Bio- 

 chemistry/' but Dr. Hopkins, J lecturer on Physio- 

 logical Chemistry at Cambridge, thus w T rote of 

 the notion in 1898, ' The view is plausible, and 

 indeed it cannot be said to be disproved, that we 

 have in the mammalian uric acid a vestigial relic of 

 the earlier type of excretion something analogous 

 with the vermiform appendix, the ductus arteriosus 

 or the ear-point. " If this or any other metabolism 

 be admitted, it is the property of inertia in protoplasm 

 and not affectability that is in the main causally 

 responsible for its continuance. 



Human character asserts itself often very early 

 indeed in certain cases ; how frequently we read of the 

 precocity of men of genius. Precocity is but our term 

 for ability, intellectuality, above the average appear- 

 ing so early that education can have had little or no 



* Loc, cit. p. 187. f The italics are mine. 



+ G. Hopkins article, "The Urine." "Text-book of Physiology 

 by British Authors," vol. ii. p. 638. (Schafer, 1900.) 



6 



