126 Progress and Civilisation. PT. m. 



subsequently transmitting them to his descendants, 

 is possessed by him alone : no animal has the slightest 

 shade of it, the most intellectual species of the brute 

 creation can never make the slightest permanent 

 advance, for they are entirely without this power of 

 grafting a new habit upon their offspring. It is, I 

 think, almost self-evident that the Progress of Civi- 

 lisation must entirely follow from this power of 

 transmitting the acquirements of one generation to 

 the succeeding one, which in turn passes it to another, 

 enriched and augmented by its own. It must also 

 be remarked that this process is a purely intellectual 

 one, and is distinct from the transmission of qualities 

 by hereditary succession. No one doubts that cor- 

 poreal, and to a certain degree mental, qualities are 

 transmitted by hereditary succession ; everyone is 

 aware that family likenesses are long preserved, and 

 peculiarities of constitution and even mental and 

 moral characteristics are often reproduced by lineal 

 descent. What is traceable in individuals is indis- 

 putable in nations and in races. It would be little 

 short of a miracle if a blue-eyed, flaxen-haired, 

 fresh-coloured child were to be born on the coast of 

 Guinea of negro parents : or if a little woolly-haired, 

 thick-lipped, ebony-skinned negro were to be the 



