SPECIFIC PSYCHICAL TALENTS 59 



matlaematics. It is, we think, an error to suppose that the 

 talent for music, for instance, or for mathematics, had its primary- 

 origin in the human species. The musical genius which pro- 

 vides for civilised mankind one of the highest and purest joys 

 is not qualitatively different from the auditive acquirements of 

 the dog or the savage. Musical gifts may be compared to an 

 instrument which our animal ancestors already possessed, which 

 they have handed down to us, and on which we have learned to 

 play with ever greater refinement, according as our culture 

 advanced. The savage, the primitive man, listening in the 

 silence of the forest to detect the sounds of an approaching 

 enemy or victim, depended in great measure on the delicacy 

 and perfection of his auditory apparatus. According as he 

 heard approaching sounds with greater or less precision was 

 he more or less likely to survive in the struggle for existence ; 

 and under these conditions the auditory apparatus was bound 

 to attain to ever greater perfection, as the plus variations called 

 forth by perturbations of intragerminal nutrition would be 

 favoured by natural selection. The auditory apparatus of man 

 was not created for the purpose of composing a symphony or 

 an oratorio, but has been evolved from the auditory apparatus 

 of his ancestors, whether animal or human. In the same way, 

 the hand was not evolved for playing the piano, but for seizing 

 prey. The achievements which the hand can accomplish, among 

 cultured nations, are artificial, in the sense that they have 

 their origin, not in the necessities of the struggle for existence, 

 but as the luxurious flowers of a rich and developed civilisa- 

 tion. 



If we accept the elementary fact that the hereditary substance 

 is composed of determinants, there can be no doubt that each 

 specific talent results from a predisposition which is nothing 

 but the expression of the preponderance of a given group of 

 determinants in the germ-plasm. There are different and 

 weU-defined determinants for the musical talent, for the mathe- 



