ioo LIFE AND HABIT. 



of the original grain, and if so, of every grain in the 

 chain of its own ancestry ; and that, as being such a 

 continuation, it must be stored with the memories 

 and experiences of its past existences, to be recollected 

 under the circumstances most favourable to recollec- 

 tion, i.e., when under similar conditions to those 

 when the impression was last made and last remem- 

 bered. Truly, then, in each case the new egg and the 

 new grain is the egg, and the grain from which its 

 parent sprang, as completely as the full-grown ox is 

 the calf from which it has grown. 



Again, in the case of some weeping trees, whose 

 boughs spring up into fresh trees when they have 

 reached the ground, who shall say at what time 

 they cease to be members of the parent tree ? In the 

 case of cuttings from plants it is easy to elude the 

 difficulty by making a parade of the sharp and sudden 

 act of separation from the parent stock, but this is 

 only a piece of mental sleight of hand ; the cutting 

 remains as much part of its parent plant as though it 

 had never been severed from it; it goes on profiting 

 by the experience which it had before it was cut off, 

 as much as though it had never been cut off at all. 

 This will be more readily seen in the case of worms 

 which have been cut in half. Let a worm be cut in 

 half, and the two halves will become fresh worms; 

 which of them is the original worm ? Surely both. 

 Perhaps no simpler case than this could readily be 

 found of the manner in which personality eludes us, 

 the moment we try to investigate its real nature. 

 There are few ideas which on first consideration appear 



