16 INITIATIVE IN EVOLUTION 



6. " Something is still wanting in the theory of Darwin and 

 Wallace which it is obligatory on us to discover if we possibly can. 

 We must seek to discover why it happens that useful variations are 

 always present." 1 



7. " It is impossible to do without the assumption that the 

 useful variations are always present, or that they always exist in 

 a sufficiently large number of individuals for the selective process." 2 



8. " Some profound connexions must exist between the utility 

 of a variation and its actual appearance, or the direction of the varia- 

 tion of a part must be determined by utility." 3 



9. That " germinal selection performs the same services for 

 the understanding of observed transformations . . . that a heredity 

 of acquired characters would perform without rendering necessary 

 so violent an assumption ! " 4 (Italics mine.) 



10. Weismann speaks warmly of Professor Lloyd Morgan for 

 his caution and calmness of judgment but complains of him that 

 he " has not been able to abandon completely the heredity of 

 acquired characters." 5 



11. As to passive effects of environment, etc., he says " the 



(Lamarckism) has performed its services and must be discarded the 

 moment it is found to be at hopeless variance with the facts." 7 



I have only to add here that several years ago I wrote to 

 Weismann drawing his attention to some facts I had observed which 

 seemed to me to be instances of use-inheritance, and I received 

 a reply in polite but brief and Prussian terms to the effect that the 

 facts referred to must be capable of some other interpretation, for 

 the machinery for their transmission did not exist. 



Each of these twelve quotations from Weismann 's essay is 

 important from the present point of view, and shows how far 

 neo-Darwinians are likely to promote the greater glory of Darwin, 

 and though more than a quarter of a century elapsed between this 

 essay and his death Weismann was not the man to have repudiated 

 any of these strong statements. 



Lighthouse Value. 



I hope at this point a small digression is not out of place in 

 order to introduce an aspect of Weismann's work which is not 

 usually appreciated. A child is aware of the great and lesser lights 

 that rule the day and night, but for modern man these are not 



x p. 15. 2 p. 14. 3 p. 18. 4 p. 40. 5 p. 56. 6 p. 11. 7 p. 17. 



Lamarckian principle is here excluded ab initio." 6 



12. "It seems to me that a hypothesis of this kind 



