98 LIFE AND HABIT. 



(there being no sudden break at any time between the 

 existence of any maternal parent and that of its 

 offspring), were it not that after a certain time the 

 changes in outward appearance between descendants 

 and ancestors become very great, the two seeming to 

 stand so far apart, that it seems absurd in any way 

 to say that they are one and the same being ; much 

 in the same way as after a time though exactly when 

 no one can say the Thames becomes the sea. More- 

 over, the separation of the identity is practically of 

 far greater importance to it than its continuance. We 

 want to be ourselves ; we do not want any one else to 

 claim part and parcel of our identity. This community 

 of identities is not found to answer in everyday life. 

 When then our love of independence is backed up by 

 the fact that continuity of life between parents and 

 offspring is a matter which depends on things which 

 are a good deal hidden, and that thus birth gives us 

 an opportunity of pretending that there has been a 

 sudden leap into a separate life ; when also we have 

 regard to the utter ignorance of embryology, which 

 prevailed till quite recently, it is not surprising that 

 our ordinary language should be found to have regard 

 to what is important and obvious, rather than to what 

 is not quite obvious, and is quite unimportant. 



Personality is the creature of time and space, 

 changing, as time changes, imperceptibly ; we are there- 

 fore driven to deal with it as with all continuous and 

 blending things; as with time, for example, itself, 

 which we divide into days, and seasons, and times, and 

 years, into divisions that are often arbitrary, but coin- 



