Note 12 — Chapter VIII · THE INFLUENCE OF TRAINING ON MIND AND MORALS.

“Many think with Herbert Spencer [who, however, holds that ‘imperfections of nature may be diminished by wise management’] that education is useless or almost powerless; that human evolution is ruled by heredity.... This modern conception, which accords to heredity a power at least equal to that ascribed by ancient poets to Fate, is assuredly excessive.... Education may supervene efficaciously; it succeeds in giving birth to artificial instincts capable of balancing the hereditary instincts, and even of suppressing them; in short, of substituting for innate ancestral habit an acquired individual habit.”—Professors Proust and Ballet.