ARTIFICIAL DEFORMATION OF CHILDREN. 219 



degree, be perpetuated when of artificial origin ; nevertheless it may 

 be maintained with reason that the grounds upon which unqualified de- 

 nial rests, are theoretically as untenable, in the present state of anthro- 

 pological science, as those upon which an unqualified assent could be 

 founded. Future results in this direction will depend largely upon the 

 possibility of connecting facts of observation with those furnished by 

 the experimental physiology of the nervous system. The question is 

 a biological one, and without adverting to what has been said concern- 

 iug variation, it may be urged that in this, as in all such problems, the 

 first necessity is to view them under biological conditions. This re- 

 quirement has not in this instance been complied with. Teleological 

 preconceptions seem to have been more or less obstructive of the view, 

 and equally so, incorrect parallels between alterations apparently Avithin 

 the limits of health, and those which involve morbid consequences. 



There is no doubt that modifications of development involve functional 

 modifications, and that imperceptible molecular changes in the brain 

 rest on precisely the same basis as perceptible ones in other parts of 

 the body. The inconceivability of spontaneous variation, properly so 

 called, the heredity of function as well as of structure, the certainty 

 that if structure changed by function is transmitted, any alterations of 

 structure which have physiologically altered function must be also in- 

 herited, appear to suggest an explanation of certain phenomena con- 

 nected with this subject, which, except on the principle of descent, do 

 not seem to be interpretable at all. 



According to the statements of Mr. Spencer, there is reason to think 

 that special structures of all varieties proceed from the special polari- 

 ties of their organic units, and that any tissue or combination of tis- 

 sues will impress the modifications it may have experienced upon its 

 component elements, between which and the aggregate life implies 

 perpetual action and reaction. If this .process, as must be generally 

 the case, takes place under normal conditions, the forces manifested 

 tend towards equilibrium without reaching, practically, an exact physi- 

 ological balance. During these adjustments and re-adjustments, how- 

 ever, one of two alternative results inevitably occurs. Either the 

 structure will take the shape determined by the pre-existing tendencies 

 of its elements, or the aggregate's altered form will mould these into 

 harmony with itself. The question thus becomes one of affection of 

 function, because, for every reason, it must be assumed that structural 

 elements organically changed will, when acting as reproductive centers, 

 engender similar changes. 



To oppose to these statements the common assertion that mutilations 

 do not become congenital, is to misconceive their character, and to con- 

 found pathological conditions with those which must be normal in order 

 to be effective. It may readily be suspected that the impossibility of 

 inheriting artificial alterations has been too hastily assumed, since this 

 involves an additional assumption, which has not been demonstrated, 



