chapter V 



Introduction to Professor Hering's lecture. 



AFTER I had finished "Evolution, Old and New," 

 jl\ I wrote some articles for the Examiner,^ in which I 

 carried out the idea put forward in " Life and Habit," 

 that we are one person with our ancestors. It follows from 

 this, that all living animals and vegetables, being — as ap- 

 pears likely if the theory of evolution is accepted — de- 

 scended from a common ancestor, are in reality one person, 

 and unite to form a body corporate, of whose existence, 

 however, they are unconscious. There is an obvious analogy 

 between this and the manner in which the component 

 cells of our bodies unite to form our single individuality, 

 of which it is not likely they have a conception, and with 

 which they have probably only the same partial and 

 imperfect sympathy as we, the body corporate, have with 

 them. In the articles above alluded to I separated the 

 organic from the inorganic, and when I came to rewrite 

 them, I found that this could not be done, and that I must 

 reconstruct what I had written. I was at work on this — to 

 which I hope to return shortly — when Dr. Krause's ' ' Erasmus 

 Darwin," with its preliminary notice by Mr. Charles Darwin, 

 came out, and having been compelled, as I have shown 

 above, by Dr. Krause's work to look a little into the German 

 language, the opportunity seemed favourable for going 

 on with it and becoming acquainted with Professor Hering's 

 lecture. I therefore began to translate his lecture at once, 

 with the kind assistance of friends whose patience seemed 



1 Since published as "God the Known and God the Unknown." 

 Fifield, IS. 6d. net. 1909. 



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