“Man is composed partly of characteristics, which are derived from pre-existing germ-cells, and over the possession of which he has no control whatsoever. Be they good, bad, or indifferent, these characteristics are his from his ancestry in virtue of his inheritance. The possession of these characteristics is to him a matter of neither blame nor praise, but of necessity. They are inevitable.”

The embryo then which is to form the individual starts its career with a certain number of innate germinal characteristics which manifest themselves in the form of tendencies to grow in this direction or that. During the period of gestation a good many of these tendencies are well developed while a good many more only manifest their exact nature in later life. But it is upon the basis of these tendencies—and upon no other—that the making of the individual is possible. They represent the total assets available for the formation of character. Nothing of any new kind can be added to them.

All that can be done under the best conceivable circumstances is so to arrange the environment and surroundings of the embryo, and the subsequent individual, so that these tendencies are acted upon in such a way that the best are developed, and the worst eliminated. It must be remembered that it is under the constant action of everything that constitutes the environment of an embryo that the mass of body-cells gradually grows into a recognisable human personality.

The question then arises, What are the factors external to the embryo which cause these germinal tendencies to become active and fully developed? These factors are those of (a) nourishment; (b) use, or exercise; and (c) injury. In the case of the human embryo by far the most important of these three factors is the first. A proper supply of nourishment and food, that is to say maternal nutrition of adequate quantity, is sufficient up to the time of birth to cause the inborn tendencies in all the body-cells gradually to assume the special characteristics of muscle, bone, gland, nerve, and so forth, which make the human embryo. After the period of embryonic life is over, the stimulus of nutrition is still sufficient for some of these body-cells. Thus we find that the hair, the teeth, the internal ears, and the organs of reproduction, all grow to their full development in the absence of any other factor or stimulus than that of nutrition. But, as we also know, this simple stimulus is not sufficient for most of the other body tissues to develop properly. They require the additional stimulus of exercise which, indeed, may be said to begin even in the life of the embryo. After that it is quite hopeless to expect a healthy embryo to develop into a fine child unless to the stimulus of nutrition there is added that of exercise. It is from the varying quantities and qualities of the three factors of nourishment, exercise, and injury, that part of the explanation is found for the variation in individuals of the same family. Starting with a good many of the same inborn tendencies none of them afterwards receive quite the same kind and amount of these stimuli, under the action of which they develop. And so we reach the second point, namely, that, in addition to innate characters certain others are subsequently acquired by the embryo of the individual in response to particular stimuli acting from without.

Here we are upon ground which is more or less in our own choice or control. It is impossible to alter germ-plasm; but it is not impossible to control the environment in which it exists. To these two groups of characters, the germinal and those acquired under stimulus, there is to be added the third group which we have mentioned on a previous page, namely, those that are usually termed variations. For example, one occasionally finds that one individual in a family, the parents of which, and the other members of which, are quite normal, may be born with six fingers instead of five. Similarly one of a family may have a variation in the direction of an extraordinary capacity for the acquisition of knowledge of certain types. Hence the genius in music, mathematics, memory, morality, and so forth. As we have seen, these variations are termed spontaneous, to express the fact that we are at present ignorant of the laws in accordance with which they arise, though, of course, it is understood that those laws must exist.

We have now surveyed the whole field of the possible origin of the characters of an embryo, and these may be summed up in the following tabular statement.

An Embryo is made up of








A. Inborn Characters—
(a) Inherited (growing under the stimulus of nutriment).
(b) Variations.
B. Acquired Characters, obtained
(a) By nutrition.
(b) By use.
(c) By injury.

The differences in individuals with which we are also familiar, are due to the varying proportions of the characters in the above table, and the characters themselves are those which constitute all the possibilities for any given person.

Should the reader doubt this, or be sceptical as to whether the whole of the making of a man is contained in the above simple scheme, it would not be difficult for him to convince himself that the statement is a true one. Let him put down this book and take a sheet of paper and a pencil. Rule the sheet of paper into three columns, and at the top of each column place a heading as follows: Inherited; Acquired; and Variations. Thus:—

Inherited.Acquired.Variations.