246 The Morality of Nature 



extensions or specializations of the first. It is apparent that 

 in his own experience he will normally extend the knowl- 

 edge which he receives, and transmit an abstract of the 

 thus increased total to his successors. 



Heredity has been already noticed in the study of elemen- 

 tary conduct and responsibility, and a knowledge of its 

 workings must be presupposed. As it affects the present 

 subject it is in general, the fixing, for the benefit of the 

 lineage, of habits and abilities and physical structures ac- 

 quired by the individual, and the abandonment of such as 

 cease to be beneficial. By fixing advantages in the lineage, 

 is meant the equipment of its successive individuals with the 

 advantages thus secured. The wonderful repetitions of 

 structure and abilities, can only be mentioned here as ob- 

 servable facts, of which the study is only just touched upon 

 by modern knowledge. But the understanding of it is made 

 easier, by the new perception that these successive individuals 

 are not newly made lives, but only the same continuing life, 

 deserting a structure which it made for itself, and making, 

 by repetition of the process, another better and newer. It 

 is however the fact and not the method which concerns us 

 here. It is seen that such structure as is found useful and 

 good in sufficient continuance of time, and is cultivated by 

 use, persists and is transmitted, from father to son, and 

 so on. This applies to the organs of intellect, and to the 

 aptitudes and abilities for conduct dependent upon them. 

 This heredity, already seen as an instrument of comparison 

 for right activity, assumes new importance as the vehicle 

 or the transmission of the higher powers of voluntary 

 conduct. 



