Heredity and the Origin of Variations. 149 



tendency to develop any particular faculty is there too ; 

 and both faculty and tendency to exercise it are handed 

 on by the continuity of germ-protoplasm or germ-cells. 

 Logically, there is no escape from the argument if put as 

 follows: The body and all its faculties (I use the term 

 *' faculties " in the broadest possible sense) are the product 

 of the germ; the acquisition of new characters or the 

 strengthening of old faculties by the body is therefore a 

 germinal product ; there is continuity of the germs of 

 parent and child; hence the acquisition by the child of 

 characters acquired by the parent is the result of germinal 

 or cellular continuity. It is not the acquired character 

 which influences the germ, but the germ which develops 

 what appears to be an acquired character. Finally, if an 

 acquired character, so called, is better developed in the 

 child than in the parent, what is this but an example of 

 variation ? And if, in a series of generations, the acquired 

 character continuously increases in strength, this must 

 be due to the continued selection of favourable variations. 

 It is clear that the organism that best uses its organs 

 has, other things equal, the best chance of survival. It 

 will therefore hand on to its offspring germinal matter 

 with an inherent tendency to make vigorous use of its 

 faculties. 



Those who argue thus deny that the body-cells can in 

 any way affect the germ-cells. To account for any con- 

 tinuous increase in faculty, they invoke variation and the 

 selection of favourable varieties. What, then, we may now 

 ask, is, on their view, the mode of origin of variations ? 



In sexual reproduction, with the union of ovum and 

 sperm, we seem to have a fertile source of variation. The 

 parents are not precisely alike, and their individual 

 differences are, ex hypothesi, germinal products. In the 

 union of ovum and sperm, therefore, we see the union of 

 somewhat dissimilar germs. And in sexual reproduction 

 we have a constantly varying series of experiments in 

 germinal combinations, some of which, we may fairly sup- 

 pose, will be successful in giving rise to new or favourable 



