PREFACE xi 



how Darwinism can account for the valuable 

 mechanical functions of lifeless structures. 1 And 

 even more arresting is the contrast between 

 Darwin's outlook on the world of life and that 

 of the eminent Dutch botanist who raised fresh 

 strains, or perhaps sorted over again old mixtures 

 of Evening Primroses, and straightway said to his 

 friends : * Go to, let us build us an exalted 

 theory of evolution based on the conception of 

 an inborn transforming force violently discharged 

 at regular intervals by every species of times past, 

 present, and to come.' And the historic fate of 

 the too-ambitious builders of Babel is already 

 evident ; for, when Professor de Vries, Professor 

 Bateson, and Mr. R C. Punnett begin to talk of 

 variability in its commonest form, their language 

 is confounded, 'that they may not understand 

 one another's speech.' - And when we remember 

 that the two last-named authorities are the recog- 

 nized English exponents of the views of the first- 

 named, it will be realized that the confusion 

 which has resulted from the misunderstanding of 

 the words 'acquired character' and the word 

 ' Mimicry ' is as nothing to the confusion worse 

 confounded which is even now upon us. The 

 misunderstanding of de Vries by his exponents 

 does however help us to solve one mystery, the 



1 Fifty Years of Darwinism, New York (1909), 61-5. See also 

 the Quarterly Review (July, 1909), 7. 



2 See 49, and Appendix D, 258. 



