HIS FAMILY. 11 



hereditary genius in the Darwin family — evidence 

 which becomes irresistible when all available details 

 of every member of the family are brought together, 

 as they are in the great " Life and Letters." When 

 it is further remembered that two of Charles Darwin's 

 sons have achieved distinction as scientific investiga- 

 tors, it will be admitted that the history of the 

 family affords a most striking example of hereditary 

 intellectual power. 



There is nothing in this history to warrant the 

 belief that the nature and direction of hereditary 

 genius receive any bias from the line of intellectual 

 effort pursued by a parent. We recognise the 

 strongest evidence for hereditary capacity, but none 

 at all for the transmission of results which follow 

 the employment of capacity. Thus Erasmus inherited 

 high intellectual power, with a bias entirely different 

 from that of his younger brother Charles — his in- 

 terests being literary and artistic rather than scientific. 

 The wide difference between the brothers seems to 

 have made a great impression upon Charles, for he 

 wrote : — 



" Our minds and tastes were, however, so different, that I 

 do not think I owe much to him intellectually. I am inclined 

 to agree with Francis Galton in believing that education and 

 environment produce only a small effect on the mind of any- 

 one, and that most of our qualities are innate " (" Life and 

 Letters," 1887, p. 22). 



Equally significant is the fact that Professor George 

 Darwin's important researches in mathematics have 



