How Darwinism Stands To-Day 389 



ideas remain valid there has been development all along the line. 

 Darwinism has evolved, as every sound theory should. 



3. In regard to the raw materials of evolution, there is 

 greater clearness than in Darwin's time as to the contrast be- 

 tween intrinsic variations of germinal origin and bodily modifi- 

 cations imprinted from without, and there are grave reasons for 

 doubting whether the latter do as such affect the race at all. 

 There is still to be heard the slogan, "Back to Lamarck!" but 

 there can be no return to any crude Lamarckism. If the indi- 

 vidual gains and loses, the individual indents and prunings, 

 really count as such in racial evolution, it must be in some 

 subtler way than is suggested by the giraffe getting its long 

 neck by ages of stretching, or the deep-sea fish becoming blind 

 by generations of darkness and disuse. There should be no haste 

 to close any door of reasonable interpretation, still less of experi- 

 mental inquiry, but there is at present amongst zoologists wide- 

 spread agreement with Sir Ray Lankester's pronouncement that 

 one of the notable advances since Darwin's day has been getting 

 rid of the Lamarckian theory of the transmission of individually 

 acquired characters or imprinted bodily modifications. Of course, 

 counting of heads is no argument; but the facts are not at 

 present in favor of the Lamarckian view. But we may perhaps 

 look for an evolution of Lamarckism as well as of Darwinism ! 



4. Darwin based his theory of evolution very deliberately 

 on the fluctuating variations which are always occurring. Given 

 time enough and a consistent sieve (the struggle for existence), 

 will not Nature achieve more or less automatically what man 

 reaches purposefully in his breeding of cattle and cultivating of 

 wheat? But modern Darwinism, while holding fast to this, wel- 

 comes the demonstration that brusque discontinuous variations 

 or mutations are common, and that they are very heritable. All 

 of a sudden, it appears, the sporting Evening Primrose may 

 produce an offspring which is potentially a new species. 



5. Darwin meant by "fortuitous variations" that he could 



