io6 THE PORTAL OF EVOLUTION 



father may be engaged upon at the time of the germination of 

 the embryo that gave you birth, and after your birth by the 

 way you cultivated such hereditary qualities during your life. 

 Whatever the main mental qualities that your father is utilis- 

 ing at the time of your conception, that is the main factor 

 in deciding the class of brain you will be possessed of, and 

 your fitness for any particular state of life, the particular 

 talents you will have ; and what memories of his ancestors 

 he is recalling will decide to what ancestors you will throw 

 back and the amount of proficiency you will be capable of 

 attaining, and the further the throw back thus evolved, the 

 more correct the deductions will be on the particular subjects 

 or acts which the brains, talents or experiences of your ances- 

 tors or of members of your family may enable you to recall, 

 exert or utilize. While the occupation you are most likely 

 to succeed at will be that which the experiences of such 

 ancestors best fit you for. The reason why certain members 

 of families are failures in work and occupation at which mem- 

 bers of such families usually succeed is that they throw back 

 to ancestors whose lives and experiences do not coincide with 

 the particular state or the particular circle of events or environ- 

 ments that are again being re-created or re-enacted in the 

 country or community in which they live at the time of their 

 rebirth. Of course this may and always will be affected by 

 their choice for good or evil. This is why certain families 

 produce big percentages of poets, sculptors, statesmen, doctors, 

 parsons, carpenters, tailors, bootmakers or tinkers. 



Now it may appear to the reader that in making the 

 statement that the mental talents of mankind are, from my 

 observation and experience, the result of prenatal actions of 

 the parent during the period previous to conception when 

 the productive system is producing the spermatozoon I 

 am making a new departure, but I would like to point out 

 to my readers that shortly after writing the above statements, 

 which were the outcome of my personal observation extending 

 over many years of experience in stock-breeding and a close 

 observation of humanity, when I chanced to read the following 

 remark of Charles Darwin in " The Origin of Species " when 

 commenting on the variation of physical, not mental faculties, 

 which I think is worthy of insertion, as it goes to prove that 

 the statements I have made are a further illustration of the 



