HEREDITY AND ENVIRONMENT 81 



man is the creature of circumstances, it would be 

 nearer the mark to say that he is the architect of 

 circumstances. It is character which builds a ca- 

 reer out of circumstances. ' ' In dealing with such 

 a surpassing genius as Goethe we may excuse 

 Lewes somewhat for putting the case very strong. 

 There is something that precedes circumstance, 

 but it can hardly be character. And unless char- 

 acter does precede circumstances it can hardly 

 be credited with building anything out of them. 

 Ruskin ("Modern Painters," III, 42) gives even 

 more credit to heredity, although, as we shall see, 

 in a somewhat mixed conception. "The great- 

 ness or the smallness of a man is determined for 

 him at his birth, as strictly as it is determined for 

 a fruit, whether it is to be a currant or an apricot. 

 Education, favorable circumstances, resolution, in- 

 dustry, may do much, in a certain sense they may 

 do everything; that is to say, they determine 

 whether the poor apricot shall fall in the form of 

 a green bead, blighted by the east wind, and be 

 trodden under foot; or whether it shall expand 

 into tender pride and sweet brightness of golden 

 velvet. ' ' These two sentences are hardly consist- 

 ent with each other. The latter allows to circum- 

 stances what the former denies to them. A great 

 man and a small man belong to the same species. 

 Birth has fixed it that neither shall be of some 

 other species. This granted, it is within the power 

 of circumstance to modify the degree of manhood 

 which either shall be. Lacassagne, a French crim- 



