12 WARFARE IN THE HUMAN BODY 



The function of the endocrine glands, in their relation 

 to general heredity, has been studied far too little. It is 

 true that Keith has explained popularly their probable 

 role with regard to racial types, but generally speaking 

 the hasty generalization of Weismann, upheld by many 

 whose record with regard to the dangers of premature 

 hypothesis might, perhaps, have safeguarded them, has been 

 a deadening influence upon biological speculation. And, 

 indeed, even those who have studied environment in the 

 belief that direct adaptation occurs, have been too apt to 

 speak of its influence in general terms, rather than to 

 inquire into the means by which it modifies an organism. 

 There seems to be no biologist who has properly grasped the 

 whole possibilities of catalysts as " tools " or instruments 

 by which the functions associated with protoplasm can 

 be activated, increased and, in certain cases, inhibited, or 

 has laid stress on the way in which all that they "create" 

 can once more give rise to other like but more complex 

 instruments. Instead of regarding protoplasm as modified 

 by the tools it employs, we hear of different kinds of pro- 

 toplasm. The very expression is an unverified hypothesis, 

 and ignores all that has been done on catalytic action by 

 the physiologists. Such assumptions differ very little 

 from those made by the vitalists who explain life by vitalism, 

 and vitalism by life. But when it is seen that proto- 

 plasm may, and actually does, alter in accordance with the 

 non-living organic tools it uses, just as races differ in accord- 

 ance with their "tools" or catalysts, it seems obvious 

 enough that varying organic phenomena follow each other 

 in accordance with the original catalytic tools employed, 

 which, in due order, are specialized by embryonic or highly 

 adapted glands such as the endocrines. For, as some may 

 be lost, so new ones can be acquired, and some again can 



