174 DOMESTICATED ANIMALS AND PLANTS 
Take a Jersey and a Shorthorn calf. Feed both all they will 
eat. Will the Jersey equal the Shorthorn in growth and in flesh ? 
No; though he will be larger than another Jersey that has not 
been so well fed. Feed a race horse liberally, and will he make 
a draft horse? No. Starve a draft horse, and will he make a 
racer? No. Everything will make what it was born to make, 
or as near it as conditions permit. It is the function of the 
environment to provide the opportunity and the materials for 
development. If we desire the development of a particular 
character, it is wise, after having secured it in the transmission, 
to provide the means for its development. If, on the other 
hand, we are conscious of the presence of an undesirable char- 
acter in the nature of the animal or the plant, it is wise to with- 
hold and prevent as far as lies within our power all influences 
and conditions favorable to its development, and thereby make 
its appearance as difficult and as unlikely as possible, hoping that 
its ugly existence will remain forever dormant, understanding 
well that the longer it remains undeveloped and unencouraged 
the less likely is it to come to the surface.1 
Environment does not add unit characters. Characters do 
not arise out of their environment. They were there before or 
they do not appear. Jersey cattle cannot be turned to red by 
keeping them in a red barn, nor does the color of the colt 
depend upon that of the working mate of the mother. 
No man was ever made a thief by seeing others steal, unless 
he had a little of the thief in him before by inheritance. We 
ourselves are not yet so far removed from savagery but that 
these fundamental barbarisms still beset us to some extent. 
The savage steals and kills and tortures, and our race is not 
yet free from some slight taint of these elemental characters. 
1 That is why it is the highest duty of every person not only to keep A/m- 
self safe, but also to keep his family line clean of undesirable blood lines which, 
if introduced, will crop out to plague generations yet unborn. We owe all this 
to the future. Unfortunately our own ancestors have not a// lived up to their 
duty in this regard, as most of us can testify by our own evil if not dangerous 
impulses, mixed here and there with the best that is in us. 
