THE SPIRITUAL WORLD. 89 



ation (and which Mr. Darwin found himself 

 quite unable to understand), remind us of the 

 theories about Nature that were thrown out by 

 the older Greek philosophers above all, of the 

 " love and strife " in the poetic system of 

 Empedocles. Such general formulae may help 

 to make the universe more intelligible to us, 

 and may possibly suggest profitable lines of 

 investigation to the inquirer, who is otherwise 

 too bewildered by details ; but they stand on a 

 perfectly different level from the everywhere 

 present fact of the struggle for existence, in 

 which those organisms that happen to possess 

 useful variations have a better chance of suc- 

 ceeding and transmitting these useful qualities 

 to offspring than those less favourably equipped. 

 The hereditary transmission of the effects of 

 use and disuse has been very readily accepted 

 by the popular imagination, and has indeed 

 bulked most largely in current versions of 

 evolution, because it has fitted in perfectly well 

 with traditional beliefs about hereditary curses, 

 and with the theological doctrine of " original 

 sin." " The fathers have eaten sour grapes, 

 and the children's teeth are set on edofe." 

 People who make stale jokes about the ances- 



