41 6 IMMORTALITY. 



forces tending to reproduce in the offspring some- 

 thinof like the averaofe character of the race must 

 preponderate so enormously, that the resistance to 

 any marked divergence from it must be incalculably 

 great, and increase in geometrical proportion the 

 more marked the divergence becomes. That is to 

 say, it is immensely more difficult to throw the rare 

 combination, not merely because there are so many 

 more of the ordinary ones, but because far more 

 force is required, because the dice are so cogged as 

 to make it nearly impossible. Hence it is useless 

 to appeal to the calculus of probabilities as to a 

 deus ex machina to help us out of the difficulty : 

 we must recognize that every case of variation re- 

 quires a definite and relatively very powerful force 

 to produce it. But where is this force to come 

 from ? Surely not from the physical conditions of 

 generation ? For these do not vary greatly in the 

 generation of a genius and of a duffer. And besides, 

 how should minute differences of times and seasons 

 and temperature and manner, etc., have such dis- 

 proportionate psychical effects ? 



But let us indulge science in these a priori pre- 

 judices, and admit that in some way, not to be 

 further explained, the physical circumstances at the 

 time of generation determine with which out of an 

 indefinite number of possible characters the off- 

 spring is to be provided. Even so the question 

 we have raised will only recur in another form, and 

 we must ask what determines generation to take 

 place at the particular moment when it will result in 

 a particular character of the offspring. For here 

 again the field of selection is extremely wide, and it 

 would surely be an immensely impressive fact that 

 a moment's delay or precipitation may make all the 



