Page 280 - erewhon

is suspended.
‘But an objector may still say, ‘Granted that the linking
between all successive generations has been so close and
unbroken, that each one of them may be conceived as able
to remember what it did in the persons of its ancestors—
how do you show that it actually did remember?’
‘The answer is: ‘By the action which each generation
takes—an action which repeats all the phenomena that we
commonly associate with memory—which is explicable on
the supposition that it has been guided by memory—and
which has neither been explained, nor seems ever likely
to be explained on any other theory than the supposition
that there is an abiding memory between successive gen-
erations.’
‘Will any one bring an example of any living creature
whose action we can understand, performing an ineffably
difficult and intricate action, time after time, with invari-
able success, and yet not knowing how to do it, and never
having done it before? Show me the example and I will say
no more, but until it is shown me, I shall credit action where
I cannot watch it, with being controlled by the same laws
as when it is within our ken. It will become unconscious as
soon as the skill that directs it has become perfected. Nei-
ther rose-seed, therefore, nor embryo should be expected to
show signs of knowing that they know what they know—if
they showed such signs the fact of their knowing what they
want, and how to get it, might more reasonably be doubt-
ed.’
Some of the passages already given in Chapter XXIII