CHAPTER XI 



DISTRIBUTION OF HEREDITY 



In this flexible and responsive life it would seem that 

 under changes of circumstance there would be such rapid 

 variation that no types would remain and a confusion of 

 forms would result. In fact there is a bewildering change- 

 ability. But there is a process which saves it from confu- 

 sion. This is conjugation; that is to say the blending of 

 two individuals in which slight differences have appeared, 

 which still permit, or even accentuate, the affinity of simi- 

 larity of racial origin. In its beginning conjugation is not 

 sexual, although it is a simple phase of a similar principle. 

 Mystery still shrouds the story of its causes, but some of 

 the associated facts are coming to light. Doubtless the 

 chemistry of protoplasm will in due time reveal the nature 

 of those energies of attraction and repulsion, which are 

 indicated by active life; and possibly these energies will 

 prove to be, as some students assert, of a nature related to 

 electro-magnetic energy. There is a method in it which in- 

 dicates polarity, and suggests a force which, like electro- 

 magnetism, produces repulsion between poles or conditions 

 which are alike, and attraction between poles or conditions 

 which are opposites. The higher evolutions of sex impulse, 

 in which the sex repels its like and attracts its unlike, seem 



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