CLASSIFICATION OF CHARACTERS 53 



of protection becomes. Thus in man the new-born infant is 

 absolutely helpless ; it relies almost entirely upon acquired, 

 and hardly at all upon inborn characters, excepting of course 

 the greatest of all inborn characters, the capacity for making 

 acquirements. 



When we speak of higher animals, we do not necessarily 

 mean that a more complicated structure exists among them, 

 or a higher differentiation of tissues than in the lower ani- 

 mals, but that there is a greater capacity for making acquire- 

 ments. What we call intelligence is in direct proportion 

 to, and dependent upon, the capacity for making acquire- 

 ments. It is because of this that we say that a dog is more 

 intelligent than a fly, and that man is more intelligent than 

 a dog. 



The various kinds of characters may be classified as 

 follows : 



Inborn. 



(1) Those inherited from a parent or parents. 



(2) Those which are due to individual variations. 



Acquired. 



(3) Those acquired before birth. (Pre-natal acquired.) 



(4) Those acquired after birth. (Post-natal acquired.) 



It must be born in mind also that (4) and even (3) may 

 be dependent upon a potentiality of making certain acquire- 

 ments, inherited as an inborn character from the parents. 



Perhaps the most important question connected with 

 heredity is whether acquirements can or cannot be trans- 

 mitted from parent to offspring. There is no question as to 

 whether inborn characters are so transmitted all biologists 

 are agreed on this point ; and no one who has studied the 

 matter at all doubts that inborn characters are trans- 

 mitted. With regard to acquired characters, however, 

 although probably the majority of biologists are convinced 

 that these characters cannot be transmitted, quite a large 



