2 62 FOOT-NOTES TO EVOLUTION. 



to act. Motion goes along lines of least resistance, and 

 such lines are part of the stock of heredity. 



Many of the impressions from environment are re- 

 ceived by the lower nerve centres alone, the sympathetic 

 system or the spinal cord. Here they are converted at 

 once into motion without rising into the region of con- 

 sciousness. Other sensations rise to the brain itself and 

 are made the basis of voluntary and conscious action. 

 And between the purely automatic actions and those 

 distinctfy conscious and voluntary there may be found 

 every possible intermediate grade. 



Moreover, a conscious action often repeated becomes 



in some degree reflex and automatic. By repeated 



action nerve connections are formed, 



The higher w hich have been compared to the auto- 



heredity. . . , , , . , 



matic switches of the electric-light plant. 



By these connections an action once become familiar 

 requires no further conscious attention. This fact is 

 known to us as the formation of habit. That which 

 we do to-day voluntarily and even laboriously, the force 

 of habit will cause us to repeat to-morrow easily, invol- 

 untarily, and whether we will or not. By the repetition 

 of conscious actions the character is formed. This for- 

 mation of personal character by action I have elsewhere 

 called " the higher heredity," as distinguished from the 

 true heredity which finds its bounds in the content of the 

 germinal cell. By means of habits each creature builds 

 up in some fashion its own life. In such way and to 

 some degree each is "the architect of his own fortunes." 

 In such manner "the vanished yesterdays" are the 

 tyrants of to-morrow. 



Besides the actual sensations, the so-called realities, 

 the brain retains also the sensations which have been re- 

 ceived, and which are not wholly lost. Memory-pictures 

 crowd the mind, mingling with pictures brought in afresh 



