Chapter VI 

 Heredity and Environment 



THE law of the survival of the average of necessity 

 compels a remodelling of our ideas in regard to 

 heredity. The prevalent belief, particularly in schools 

 of conservative thought, was that there were good 

 families and common people, clever and stupid, 

 smart and dull, energetic and lazy, rich and poor, 

 thrifty and careless, and that these diversities were 

 produced through heredity or strains of blood. The 

 same was believed in regard to criminality or vice. 

 Now we know both by investigation and experiment 

 that it is not so ; that Man, like the ordinary animal, 

 inherits certain physical characteristics and instincts 

 which he cannot get over or depart from, otherwise he 

 would not be a normal type ; each individual man or 

 animal has certain characteristics apart from those of 

 the genus to which he belongs which make up what 

 we call his individuality, e.g. shape of nose, colour 

 of eye or hair, particular manner of walking, or speech, 

 or conduct, some of which are hereditary, some the 

 result of imitation or environment. But the really 

 important characteristics are entirely the result of 

 environment, which includes not only the class into 

 which a man is born, but every possible influence which 

 surrounds him as a child, whether of nature, home, 

 temper, culture, criminality or goodness of parents, the 

 education which he receives, and the religious influence 

 and guidance which is brought to bear upon him. A 

 child is often remarked to look, to speak, to act, to 



