SOCIAL HEREDITY 195 



traditional elements or constitutes an extension, com- 

 plication, and enrichment of the existing tradition. 

 Norman-French was largely imitated by the English 

 people, and so became in large part incorporated with 

 the English language. The religion of Buddha was 

 adopted by the Japanese people, and partially fused with 

 rather than supplanted, their national Shinto religion of 

 ancestor-worship. 44 In this way the new is amalgamated 

 with the old, and usages or traditions change very gradu- 

 ally under the strain of meeting new conditions and new 

 needs. But in the change the ascendancy of the old form 

 still immensely outweighs the prestige of recent innova- 

 tions. " Passive obedience to ancestral orders, customs, 

 and influence, comes to be not replaced, but neutralized 

 in part, by submission to the pressure, advice, and sug- 

 gestions of contemporaries. In acting according to these 

 last-named motives, the modern man flatters himself that 

 he is making a free choice of the propositions that are 

 made to him, whereas, in reality, the one that he welcomes 

 and follows is the one that meets his preexistent wants 

 and desires, wants and desires which are the outcome of 

 his habits and customs, of his whole past of obedience." 45 

 With regard to this point Professor Boas reminds us 

 that we are only too apt to forget entirely the general, 

 and, for most of us, the purely traditional basis of our 

 reasoning, and to assume that our conclusions are abso- 

 lute truth. In so doing we commit the error of less 

 civilized peoples. They are more easily satisfied than 

 we are of the truth of their conclusions. Their fallacy 

 lies in assuming the truth of the traditional element which 

 enters into their explanations; consequently they accept 



teZ., pp. 336-337. 

 Tarde, op. cit., p. 246. 



