234 A STUDY IN HEREDITY 



associated with the size of the brain, the larger brain being the 

 concomitant of greater receptivity, and, as a consequence, of 

 lessened instinct. Associated with this truth is the fact that 

 modem representatives of ancient animals (e.g. ungulates) have 

 much larger brains than their ancestors, denoting the evolution in 

 them of the supremely important faculty of acquiring mental 

 characters. Now, since so little that is mental is inborn in man, 

 while so much is acquired, we must conclude that differences in 

 the sizes and shapes of the brains of different races imply, not 

 inborn mental differences, but differences in the power of 

 acquiring mental characters; and, therefore, for example, that 

 the native Australian, with his small brain, differs from the 

 Chinaman or Japanese, with his large brain, not mainly in that 

 which is inborn, but mainly in that he has lesser power of 

 acquiring complex mental characters. If this is true, and there 

 is a mass of evidence proving that it is true, for children of one 

 race reared by another and very different race develop the mental 

 features of their educators, not of their progenitors (e.g. Europeans 

 reared by savages, or savages reared by Europeans), then much of 

 the reasoning of numerous thinkers has been founded on false 

 premises, and is invalid. They have commonly estimated the 

 mental calibre of a race by the intellectual feats performed by it, 

 but plainly these are wrong criteria, since whether these feats be 

 great or small depends almost entirely on the environment, that 

 is, on education. A South Sea Islander, for instance, would, and 

 could, do nothing in his ancestral environment compared to what 

 he would be capable of intellectually were he during early life 

 transferred to, and trained in the midst of, a learned and scientific 

 society. 



In discussing this subject, one is embarrassed by the wealth of 

 the material that presents itself for criticism. In the lightest, as 

 in the weightiest, literature, it is constantly assumed that various 

 racial peculiarities and differences, which are manifestly acquired, 

 are inborn ; that this or that race is inherently brave, or resolute, 

 or enterprising, or industrious, or gifted with a genius for colonisa- 

 tion or empire, while this or that other race is timid, or irresolute. 



