1 82 TRANSMISSION OF ACQUIRED CHARACTERS 



Over and over again in the prolific literature of this discussion 

 the syllogism is advanced, either in regard to gout or something 

 analogous 



Gout is a modification of the body, an acquired character ; 

 Gout is transmissible; 

 Modifications are sometimes transmissible. 



It may be formally a good argument, but there is every reason 

 to deny the major premiss. There is no proof that the gouty 

 habit had an exogenous origin that it was, to begin with, for 

 instance, the direct result of high living ; though it is generally 

 admitted that excesses in eating or drinking may give a stimulus 

 to its expression. " The conclusion I have arrived at," says 

 Prof. D. J. Hamilton (1900, p. 297), " is that the gouty habit of 

 body has arisen as a variation, and as such is hereditarily trans- 

 missible, and that excess of diet and alcohol merely renders 

 the habit of body apparent." It may also be pointed out that 

 gout and rheumatism and the like are rather processes of meta- 

 bolism than structural modifications, though the latter may 

 ensue. 



After pointing out the irrelevancy of citing cases of the here- 

 ditary recurrence of polydactylism, haemophilia, colour-blindness 

 in man, or the absence of horns in cattle or of tails in cats, as 

 instances of the transmission of acquired characters, Prof. Ernst 

 Ziegler says (1886, p. 13) : " Only that can be regarded as ' ac- 

 quired ' which is produced in the course of the individual life, 

 during or after the period of development, exclusively under 

 the influence of external conditions ; the term is in no wise 

 applicable to peculiarities which, as one says, arise of themselves 

 from a predisposition already present in the germ." 



Let us state the case once more. There is no doubt that the 

 expression of a germinal variation during the lifetime of an individual 

 may be sometimes definitely associated with a particular external 

 stimulus. It may thus be mistaken for a modification, and mis- 

 takenly spoken of as " acquired." But the relation between the 



