62 EVOLUTION AND ETHICS. n 



than a bundle of potentialities. But, very early, 

 these become acutalities; from childhood to age 

 they manifest themselves in dulness or brightness, 

 weakness or strength, viciousness or uprightness; 

 and with each feature modified by confluence 

 with another character, if by nothing else, the 

 character passes on to its incarnation in new 

 bodies. 



The Indian philosophers called character, as 

 thus defined, " karma." It is this karma which 

 passed from life to life and linked them in the 

 chain of transmigrations; and they held that it is 

 modified in each life, not merely by confluence of 

 parentage, but by its own acts. They were, in 

 fact, strong believers in the theory, so much dis- 

 puted just at present, of the hereditary transmis- 

 sion of acquired characters. That the manifes- 

 tation of the tendencies of a character may be 

 greatly facilitated, or impeded, by conditions, of 

 which self-discipline, or the absence of it, are 

 among the most important, is indubitable; but 

 that the character itself is modified in this way is 

 by no means so certain; it is not so sure that the 

 transmitted character of an evil liver is worse, or 

 that of a righteous man better, than that which 

 he received. Indian philosophy, however, did not 

 admit of any doubt on this subject; the belief in 

 the influence of conditions, notably of self-disci- 

 pline, on the karma was not merely a necessary 

 postulate of its theory of retribution, but it pre- 



