118 THE CONTROL OF LIFE 



term for the relation of organic continuity between 

 successive generations, there can be no other side to 

 it. But there is no harm in using the phrase " the other 

 side of heredity " to indicate that the fatahstic impression 

 of determinateness is not the whole truth. There is 

 another side to the inevitable reappearance of an evil 

 past, another side to the inexorable transmission of 

 defects, another side to the terribly discouraging heredi- 

 tary handicapping, another side to the undeniable lien 

 that our ancestry has over us. We must drie our 

 weird, but] we need not surrender the captaincy of 

 our soul. 



(1) Perhaps it is unwise to seek much satisfaction 

 in uncertainties that surround inheritance, which lead 

 some people to " risk it," as they say. For the uncer- 

 tainties are disappearing. Yet we may be pardoned 

 for recalling a really beautiful expression of the unpre- 

 dictabihty of heredity from Thomas Fuller's Scripture 

 Observations : — " Lord, I find the genealogy of my 

 Saviour strangely checkered with four remarkable 

 changes in four immediate generations. 



*' 1. Roboam begat Abia ; that is a bad father begat a bad 

 son. 



"2. Abia begat Asa ; that is a bad father a good son. 



" 3. Asa begat Josaphat ; that is a good father a good son. 



" 4. Josaphat begat Joram ; that is a good father a bad son. 



" I see. Lord, from hence, that my father's piety 

 cannot be entailed ; it is bad news for me. But I also 

 see, that actual impiety is not always hereditary ; that 

 is good news for my son." 



