231 



Instead of considering the multitudinous forms or 

 varieties of skin affections in detail, I have preferred, for 

 obvious reasons, to deal with them for the most part 

 synthetically, and have now referred to the various groups 

 into which every case of skin disease must fall. I have 

 subjected each group to an examination as to how far 

 heredity can be regarded as an element in its production, 

 and I think I have shown that, in at least the majority 

 of them, hereditary transmission or predisposition is an 

 etiological factor of essential importance. 



My observations on the all-pervading law of heredity must 

 now draw to a close. I can only hope that the results of 

 my study may be as gratifying to my readers as the task 

 has been to myself, and that at least some good may have 

 been affected in consequence of my inquiry. I have, for I 

 believe the first time, subjected the various diseases and 

 disorders to which the human body is liable to an 

 examination, as to how far they are the results of or 

 referable to hereditary transmission, and in the words of 

 Mr. Jonathan Hutchinson, to whose labours I owe so much, 

 "It is abundantly sufficient for my ambition, if, availing 

 myself thankfully so far as my knowledge extended, of the 

 labours of those who have gone before me, I have succeeded 

 in any degree in making opinion more definite, and giving 

 emphasis to that which is true." 



In conclusion, the following summary of the views 

 enunciated in these papers may not be altogether unac- 

 ceptable. 



Summary. Heredity, as we have seen, is one of the 

 fundamental laws of living Nature, by which all organic 

 beings tend to repeat themselves in their progeny, and it 

 underlies the grand evolutionary processes by which, 

 according to the Darwinian theory, all organic beings have 



