ACQUIRED CIL\R.\CTERS 209 



involve in its corrupting effect the whole man.^ In 

 acknowledging the inheritance by offspring of certain 

 acquired diseases, Professor Weismann prefers to de- 

 scribe the first stage of the process as an ^'infection of 

 the germ," rather than as ''a definite variation" in its 

 constitution.^ Now the very word "infection" is fre- 

 quently employed by theologians to describe the effect 

 of Adam's sin upon human nature.^ 



If a failure of the various bodily functions to work 

 in mutual harmony constitutes physical disease, surely 

 a state of conflict between the animal and spiritual 

 propensities of our moral nature may be called moral 

 disease. It is, conscience being witness, a condition 

 that ought not to be — a condition which hinders the 

 man from fulfilling the proper function of his moral 

 nature. Moreover, it is a deeply seated disease, so 

 deeply seated that could we describe it as "a definite 

 variation," w^e should still have reason to beheve its 

 production of some effect upon the germ-cell to be 

 possible, even if we accepted the general vahdity of 



^ In describing our present condition as a "corruption of nature" 

 we do not commit ourselves to a denial that the nature wherewith we 

 sin is the nature that was evolved in its physical aspects from the 

 lower species. The point is that the conflict "between nature and 

 nurture," as Tennant describes it, — which he refers exclusively 

 to natural causes and we refer to a loss of the grace which was super- 

 added in order to prevent an evil result of such conflict — must, 

 whether by a leap or gradually, produce a condition within our na- 

 ture that may rightly be called "corruption." 



2 As quoted above. 



3 Our ninth article says, "And this infection of nature doth re- 

 main," etc. 



15 



Z^ 



