Chapter VIII 
Property, Common Sense, and Protoplasm 
NE would think the issue stated in the three preceding 
chapters was decided in the stating. This, as I 
have already implied, is probably the reason why those who 
have a vested interest in Mr. Darwin’s philosophical 
reputation have avoided stating it. 
It may be said that, seeing the result is a joint one, 
inasmuch as both ‘‘res”’ and “ me,” or both luck and 
cunning, enter so largely into development, neither factor 
can claim pre-eminence to the exclusion of the other, But 
life is short and business long, and if we are to get the one 
into the other we must suppress details, and leave our words 
pregnant, as painters leave their touches when painting 
from nature. If one factor concerns us greatly more than 
the other, we should emphasize it, and let the other go 
without saying, by force of association. There is no fear of 
its being lost sight of ; association is one of the few really 
liberal things in nature; by liberal, I mean precipitate 
and inaccurate ; the power of words, as of pictures, and 
indeed the power to carry on life at all, vests in the fact 
that association does not stick to the letter of its bond, but 
will take the half for the whole without even looking closely 
at the coin given to make sure that it is not counterfeit. 
Through the haste and high pressure of business, errors 
arise continually, and these errors give us the shocks of 
which our consciousness is compounded. Our whole 
conscious life, therefore, grows out of memory and out of 
the power of association, in virtue of which not only does 
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