38 HEREDITY. 



The same variation in causes obtain in the in- 

 dividual life. To illustrate : I had a friend who 

 was a skilled mechanic, a good farmer, an able 

 and eloquent speaker. His mechanical ingenuity 

 was inborn. He was never in a manual training 

 school, but was an expert with tools and was 

 able to do exceptionally fine work. He had some 

 natural ability as a farmer, was brought up on 

 Inborn versus a ^ arm anc ^ ma de a success at farming. As a 

 Acquired Traits, boy he was timid and diffident, could not appear 

 before an audience and was sadly deficient in lan- 

 guage; but by persistent training and careful 

 study he became one of the best extemporaneous 

 speakers on the platform. Now, his mechanical 

 ingenuity was largely inherited, his success as a 

 farmer was perhaps as much due to postnatal 

 training as to heredity, while his ability as a pub- 

 lic speaker was largely acquired. 



In like manner all of our tastes and talents, 



vices and virtues, are a product of a series of 



E Tr it h s P rena ^ a ^ an< ^ postnatal influences of ever varying 



Many Causes, potency. It is, therefore, irrational to attribute 



one-fourth to heredity, or to attempt to break 



the chain of influences at birth and say that this 



is entirely due to heredity and that is entirely due 



to postnatal influences. 



To simplify the subject, we may divide the 

 formative elements of a man's life into three gen- 

 Generation, eral divisions generation, education and regen- 



Education, eration ; or the force of heredity, the force of en- 

 Regeneration. . J ' 



vironment and the grace of GocL< Each of these 



three factors has its part to perform in the pro- 

 duction, development and maturing of every well 

 rounded life. They are incomparable; no one 



