S86 



APPENDIX. 



tion to sport in the progeny, even when there is only one 

 parent, as in many vegetables, and to investigate how 

 much variation is modified by the mind or nervous sen- 

 sation of the parents, or of the living thing itself during 

 its progress to maturity; how far it depends upon exter- 

 nal circumstance, and how far on the will, irritability 

 and muscular exertion, is open to examination and expe- 

 riment. In the first place, we ought to investigate its 

 dependency upon the preceding links of the particular 

 chain of life, variety being often merely types or approxi- 

 mations of former parentage ; thence the variation of the 

 family, as well as of the individual, must be embraced 

 by our experiments. 



This continuation of family type, not broken by ca- 

 sual particular aberration, is mental as well as corporeal, 

 and is exemplified in many of the dispositions or in- 

 stincts of particular races of men. These innate or con- 

 tinuous ideas or habits, seem proportionally greater in 

 the insect tribes, those especially of shorter revolution ; 

 and forming an abiding memor}^, may resolve much of 

 the enigma of instinct, and the foreknowledge which 

 these tribes have of what is necessary to completing their 

 round of life, reducing this to knowledge, or impres- 

 sions, and habits, acquired by a long experience. This 

 greater continuity of existence, or rather continuity of 

 perceptions and mpressions, in insects, is highly pro- 

 bable ; it is even dijSicult in some to ascertain the parti- 

 cular stops when each individuality commences, under 

 the different phases of egg, larva, pupa, or if much con- 



