HEREDITY AND ENVIRONMENT 173 



favorable conditions for development, nor jiist how much he 

 can endure in the way of adverse circumstances without some 

 of the more undesirable characters of his family line under- 

 going development and getting the upper hand. 



By any and all counts, with our animals and plants and with. 

 ourselves we are bound to maintain the most favorable environ- 

 ment possible, but it should be on the score of its influence 

 upon development, not under the mistaken idea that it can take 

 the place of heredity or in any other way compensate for the 

 failure of inheritance or mistakes of the ancestors. 



The function of environment is to assist or to hinder in 

 development. If environment is then so mighty a factor, is not 

 the old tradition right after all ? No. The characters of the 

 family line are planted before birth by the particular ancestry, 

 whatever that may be. In all cases they are both good and bad. 

 In the best families and the purest blood, plant or animal, the 

 bad have been reduced to a relatively low intensity and a cor- 

 responding low probability of development. In the worst fami- 

 lies, unfortunately, the bad characters are the strongest ones, 

 likely to develop even under the best conditions, because the 

 better faculties are in low intensity — mathematically low in 

 power. 



Now the character of the individual in his own personality 

 will depend not so much upon his total inheritance as upon the 

 particular characters that develop, and these will depend very 

 largely, though not entirely, upon the conditions with which he 

 is surrounded, especially in early life. 



To illustrate : Take ten ears of corn that look exactly alike. 

 Plant them separately in rows, side by side, giving to each the 

 same soil and the same cultivation ; that is, surround them 

 with the same conditions and opportunities. Will they yield 

 alike ? Most assuredly not. They may differ as much as 50 

 per cent, and possibly more. Why ? They were bred differ- 

 endy ; they inherited different powers of germination and of 

 vigor in obtaining and assimilating the plant food of the soil. 



