ON FACT VS. THEORY 



combinations between the classes? Or to go above 

 the classes and make combinations between the 

 subkingdoms ? 



"Give us time," says Mr. Burbank, "and we 

 could accomplish anything. 



"The limitations of our work are not limitations 

 imposed by Nature; they are limitations imposed, 

 alone, by the clock and the calendar. 



"Here we are, fighting ten thousand years of 

 hardened heredity with five or ten years of new 

 environment; sometimes we succeed; it is no 

 wonder that more often we fail; in five years, 

 however, we can usually work a transformation; 

 if we could afford to spend fifty years on a single 

 plant, we could upset every rule that has ever been 

 formulated about that plant; and if we could 

 spend five thousand years, we could, simply by 

 guiding Nature, accomplish, well, anything. 



"Every season we are working changes which 

 Nature would take ages to work; but from a 

 practical standpoint we must seek always to take 

 advantage of the old heredities which Nature has 

 stored up to make them serve our ends, because 

 this can be done quickly; rather than to create and 

 fix new heredities which might take so long as to 

 rob our work of its usefulness." 



'' : l @M 

 Here, then, is Mr. Burbank's bird's-eye view: 



[237] 



