INDUCTION. 113 



appreciated the connection between inheritance 

 and his general theories, and tried to get an 

 experimental basis for inference. 



Darwin, as he himself confessed, had to make 

 a theory on every subject, and the intimate 

 relation between inheritance and his other 

 theories led him irresistibly to form a theory 

 on inheritance. Like Newton, he established 

 the best of theories, and, like him, "was also 

 capable of proposing one of the worst." He 

 finally published the hypothesis under the 

 title u Pangenesis," in Volume II. of "Varia- 

 tion of Animals and Plants under Domestica- 

 tion." 1 The reason he gave for forming it was 

 to bring the vast number of perplexing facts of 

 inheritance together under a single intelligible 

 point of view. To do this he assumed the 

 existence of minute bodies called gemmules, 

 which are cast off by all the living cells of the 

 animal or plant body at all stages of its exist- 

 ence, and which multiply by division, have the 

 power of remaining dormant through an in- 

 definite number of generations, possess certain 

 remarkable affinities, etc. They were sup- 

 posed to collect in the reproductive elements, 

 and determine the character of the offspring. 

 Darwin endeavored to make the assumption 



i Pages 349-399- 

 8 



