The Sacred Beetle and Others 



completing and improving on my first at- 

 tempt, would behold the extinction of those 

 antiquated old things. Why should the 

 lump on my back wither purposeless? Why 

 should my endeavour, repeated year after 

 year for centuries, never achieve the pro- 

 mised result? " 



Listen to me,, O ambitious one! iXhe 

 theorists. It is true, declare that every casual 

 acquisition, however trifling, Is handed down 

 and increases if it be profitable; but don't 

 rely overmuch on that assertion. I do not 

 doubt the advantages which you might gain 

 from a little surplus ornament. What I do 

 very much doubt is the efficacity of time and 

 environment as an evolutionary factor. You 

 will be well-advised to believe that, born in 

 the dim and distant past with a transient 

 callosity, you are continuing and will continue 

 to be born with that rudimentary excrescence 

 without any chance of fixing It, hardening It 

 into a horn or obtaining an additional deco- 

 ration for your wedding-garment. 



Be we men or Dung-beetles, we are all 

 created In the image of an unalterable proto- 

 type : the changing conditions of life change 

 us slightly on the surface but never In the 

 framework of our being. The verdigris of 



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