WORLD TEACHERS.

Southland Times, Issue 17025, 25 April 1912, Page 2

WORLD TEACHERS.

(To (he Editor.) Sir, —I am a disappointed and discouraged man. I set out gaily enough on my quest for information—much of the theories of Theosophy I already knew, my object was to get into touch with the evidence on which these theories were based—but I am thrown back on myself. Mr McDonald says that ho could prove the truth of Theosophical teachings easily enough “but not within half a column of newspaper space.” Seeing that he has already filled three and a-half columns of newspaper space the objection loses much of its force. I shall not press him further, being well assured that it is not the want of space but the want of evidence to fill the space that is the real trouble. Mr McDonald seems to regard heredity as confined to parentage in the narrow sense. On the contrary, heredity stretches back through aeons of time, back through sub-human ancestry it may be, though the chance of any determinant exorcising an influence from such far-off parentage is necessarily remote. Twins, though of the same parentage may not have the same heredity. What determines the mixing of the ancestral characters we do not at present know, but it is plain enough that broadly, "like begets like.” To reject the possibility of the inheritance of mental and moral qualities and admit that of physical characters seems to me to be an altogether untenable position. If a breeder of sheep dogs wishes to raise stock does he select as parents animals which are lazy, stupid, or disobedient, however true to the physical type of the breed they may he? And why does he not? Because he knows that mental and moral qualities are heritable. And on what a worthless foundation does the science of eugenics rest If mental and moral nature are not a result of ancestry? Though I have read a good deal on the subject of heredity, Mr McDonald’s pronouncement is quite new to me and I should bo pleased to learn what authorities he can cite as supporting it.—l am, etc., A. 24th April.