II 



NOTES 95 



so long that its beginning is beyond the reach of 

 calculation, and its end will be coincident with the 

 destruction of the world." (Rhys Davids, Il'thhert 

 Lectures, p. 92.) 



In the theory of evolution, the tendency of a germ 

 to develop according to a certain specific type, e.g. of 

 the kidney bean seed to grow into a plant having all 

 the characters of Phaseolus vulgaris, is its ' Karma,' 

 It is the " last inheritor and the last result " of all 

 the conditions that have affected a line of ancestry 

 which goes back for many millions of years to the 

 time when life first appeared on the earth. The 

 moiety B of the substance of the bean plant (see 

 Note 1) is the last link in a once continuous chain 

 extending from the primitive living substance : and 

 the characters of the successive species to which it 

 has given rise are the manifestations of its gradually 

 modified Karma. As Prof. Khys Davids aptly says, 

 the snowdrop " is a snowdrop and not an oak, and 

 just that kind of snowdrop, because it is the outcome 

 of the Karma of an endless series of past existences." 

 {Hibbert Lectures, p. 114.) 



Note 7 (p. 64). 



"It is interesting to notice that the very point 

 which is the weakness of the theory — the supposed 

 concentration of the effect of the Karma in one new 

 being — presented itself to the early Buddhists them- 

 selves as a difficulty. They avoided it, partly by 

 explaining that it was a particular thirst in the 

 creature dying (a craving, Tanha, which plays other- 



