58 Unconscious Memory 



Hering reaches his conclusion by physical methods, while 

 I reached mine, as I am told, by metaphysical. I never yet 

 could understand what " metaphysics " and " meta- 

 physical " mean ; but I should have said I reached it by 

 the exercise of a little common sense while regarding 

 certain facts which are open to every one. There is, 

 however, so far as I can see, no difference in the conclusion 

 come to. 



The view which connects memory with vibrations may 

 tend to throw light upon that difficult question, the 

 manner in which neuter bees acquire structures and 

 instincts, not one of which was possessed by any of their 

 direct ancestors. Those who have read " Life and Habit " 

 may remember, I suggested that the food prepared in the 

 stomachs of the nurse-bees, with which the neuter working 

 bees are fed, might thus acquire a quasi-seminal character, 

 and be made a means of communicating the instincts and 

 structures in question. ^ If assimilation be regarded as 

 the receiving by one substance of the rhythms or undula- 

 tions from another, the explanation just referred to 

 receives an accession of probability. 



If it is objected that Professor Hering's theory as to 

 continuity of vibrations being the key to memory and 

 heredity involves the action of more wheels \\-ithin wheels 

 than our imagination can come near to comprehending, 

 and also that it supposes this complexity of action as going 

 on within a compass which no unaided eye can detect by 

 reason of its littleness, so that we are carried into a fairy- 

 land with which sober people should have nothing to do, 

 it may be answered that the case of light affords us an 

 example of our being truly aware of a multitude of minute 

 actions, the hundred million millionth part of which we 

 should have declared to be beyond our ken, could we not 

 incontestably prove that we notice and count them all 

 with a very sufficient and creditable accuracy. 



1 Life and Habit, p. 2^/. 



