HUMAN AND ANIMAL EVOLUTION CONTRASTED 15 



sites which may, either early or late, attack the indi- 

 vidual that grows from the egg. We can only say 

 that such diseases are inherited by using the term 

 "inheritance" with a totally different meaning from 

 that which we have been accustomed to give it since 

 Weismann led us to a conception of the subject, us- 

 ing the term, indeed, in much the same way as we 

 shall use it i)resently under the designation of social 

 heredity. That type of heredity that denies the 

 transmission of acquired characters, which tells us 

 that characters are so firmly fixed generation after 

 generation, and which has been the foundation upon 

 which organic evolution has been builded, is a totally 

 distinct phenomenon from the transmission from 

 parent to child of the germ parasites of the venereal 

 diseases. If syphilis can actually affect the germi- 

 nal substance so that its effects are produced in the 

 following generation through that germinal sub- 

 stance, we might then call it inherited ; but so long as 

 the child simply becomes inoculated by the germs 

 which are present in the parent it is not true inherit- 

 ance. 



One other misunderstanding must also be guarded 

 against. There are certain substances which act as 

 poisons upon the individual and also upon the germi- 

 nal substances which the individual carries in his 

 body. These may produce an effect upon the first 

 individual acted upon by them and also upon sub- 

 sequent generations because they directly poison the 

 germinal substance. For this reason they are called 

 racial poisons. The poisonous action of alcohol and 

 of the syphilitic poison are the best-known examples, 

 for these disastrous substances directly poison the 

 germinal substance, so that subsequent generations 



