248 
HAROLD’S DISCUSSIONS. 
become adapted to the new conditions, and con¬ 
sequently, for tlie most part, perished. 
We look about us and see no appreciable change. 
The forest appears the same year after year, the sea 
seems to roll upon the same shore, and the distant 
mountains cut an unchanging silhouette into the sky. 
Man’s life is so brief that he can not see the motion 
of the centuries. In a flash of lightning all things 
seem stationary. “ I believe the gardener is immor¬ 
tal,” said the rose to the lily. “ I have watched him 
ever since I opened, and he is just the same; and the 
tulip, who died yesterday, told me the same.” 
But the mountains have all come out of the sea, 
and the river valleys have been cut out, grain by 
grain, and the boundaries of the ocean are ever be¬ 
coming narrower, as the mountains are carried down 
by the waters and deposited in their depths. 
ACQ'UIRED CHARACTERISTICS. 
• Geology teaches us beyond a doubt that environ¬ 
ment is ever changing. The change may be slight in 
a century, or even in a thousand years. But looking 
back over the eras of life, we can not doubt the fact 
of mutation. As we have seen, environment does 
change the characteristics of plants and animals, and, 
as we shall see in the chapter on Natural Selection, 
these characteristics reappear more or less intensified 
in at least some of the descendants. The question now 
arises. Do the descendants inherit acquired character¬ 
istics ? This question is debated by scientists with 
much learning. Some claim they are, others insist 
