EFFECT OF LITERATURE 89 



unconscious, and attach little significance to them. 

 But they are only the superficial part of reaction to 

 a new environment, and the changes in physiognom}^ 

 palate, habitual diet, digestive powers, and general 

 habits have their definite physical correlates in 

 changes of blood and brain and physiological rhythm. 

 Such influences are more marked when thej'- have 

 acted through the whole life, and they mould a 

 population in one direction. 



Among modern civilized peoples, however, the 

 circumambient media that are most important and 

 that have the greatest effect are those affecting the 

 mental and emotional qualities. From earliest child- 

 hood, the young Englishman, Frenchman, German 

 and Russian are moulded in different ways. The 

 systems of education, the books that they are given 

 to read, the aspects in which history is presented to 

 them, their companionship at school, the examina- 

 tions they have to pass, the modes of entrance into 

 professions or into commercial life, their military 

 service, all stamp them with a separate nationalism. 



Physical differences are slow -moving secular 

 affairs, their summation being effected only after 

 long ages. The results of the environment on the 

 mind are reflected in literature and the Press, and 

 yet almost limit themselves to the confines of each 

 nation, for the numbers of a nation that read an 

 alien literature or take their daily prejudices from 

 an alien newspaper are almost negligible. Although 

 the physical and mental qualities that are acquired 

 by an individual are not transmitted to his descen- 

 dants but have to be acquired afresh in each genera- 

 tion, every new acquisition by a literature is inherited. 



