46 An Examination of Weismannism. 



second polar body. So long as this view is itself the 

 subject of debate, he cannot prove it by the fact in 

 question. In other words, unless we have already 

 agreed that the second polar body has the function 

 which Weismann assigns to it, we cannot accept the 

 fact which he adduces as furnishing any evidence of 

 his view touching the function of the second polar 

 body. 



For these reasons I cannot see that the subordinate 

 theory of polar bodies is required in the interests of 

 the general theory of germ-plasm. The difficulties 

 which it is adduced to meet do not appear to me to 

 be any difficulties at all. Therefore, in now proceeding 

 to consider what in my opinion are the real difficulties 

 which lie against the major theory of germ-plasm, I 

 shall not again allude to the minor — and. in this con- 

 nexion, superfluous — theory of polar bodies. 



Such, then, is Professor Weismann's theory of 

 heredity in its original and strictly logical form. In 

 the course of our examination of it which is to 

 follow in Chapter III and IV, we shall find that in 

 almost every one of its essential features, as above 

 stated, the theory has had to undergo — or is demon- 

 strably destined to undergo — someradical modification. 

 But I have thought it best to begin by presenting 

 the whole theory in its completely connected state, 

 as it is in this way alone that we shall be able to 

 disconnect what I regard as the untenable parts from 

 the parts which still remain for investigation at the 

 hands of biological science. Such, indeed, is the only 

 object of my " Examination of Weismannism." For, 

 rightly or wrongly, it appears to me that the unques- 

 tionable value of his elaborate speculations is seriously 



