INSTINCT AS INHERITED MEMORY. 207 



again, till people get to know worse and worse how to 

 do things, the oftener they practise them. 



" And if this phenomenon appear strange, it must be 

 observed that analogous states occur in ourselves. All 

 that we do from habit — walking, writing, or practising a 

 mechanical act, for instance — all these and many other 

 very complex acts are performed without consciousness. 



" Instinct appears stationary. It does not, like intel- 

 ligence, seem to grow and decay, to gain and to lose. 

 It does not improve." 



Naturally. For improvement can only as a general 

 rule be looked for along the line of latest development, 

 that is to say, in matters concerning which the creature 

 is being still consciously exercised. Older questions 

 are settled, and the solution must be accepted as final, 

 for the question of living at all would be reduced to an 

 absurdity, if everything decided upon one day was to 

 be undecided again the next ; as with painting or music, 

 so with life and politics, let every man be fully per- 

 suaded in his own mind, for decision with wrong will 

 be commonly a better policy than indecision — I had 

 almost added with right ; and a firm purpose with risk 

 will be better than an infirm one with temporary 

 exemption from disaster. Every race has made its 

 great blunders, to which it has nevertheless adhered, 

 inasmuch as the corresponding modification of other 

 structures and instincts was found preferable to the 

 revolution which would be caused by a radical change 

 of structure, with consequent havoc among a legion of 

 vested interests. Rudimentary organs are, as has been 

 often said, the survivals of these interests — the sums of 



