There is nothing in this history to warrant the belief that the nature and direction of hereditary genius receive any bias from the line of intellectual effort pursued by a parent. We recognise the strongest evidence for hereditary capacity, but none at all for the transmission of results which follow the employment of capacity. Thus Erasmus inherited high intellectual power, with a bias entirely different from that of his younger brother Charles--his interests being literary and artistic rather than scientific. The wide difference between the brothers seems to have made a great impression upon Charles, for he wrote:-- “Our minds and tastes were, however, so different, that I do not think I owe much to him intellectually. I am inclined to agree with Francis Galton in believing that education and environment produce only a small effect on the mind of anyone, and that most of our qualities are innate” (“Life and Letters,” 1887, p. 22). Equally significant is the fact that Professor George Darwin’s important researches in mathematics have been applied to astronomy--subjects which were not pursued by his father. [Sidenote: CHARACTER AND POWERS.] It appears probable that Charles Darwin’s unique power was largely due to the inheritance of the imagination of his grandfather combined with the acute observation of his father. Although he possessed an even larger share of both these qualities than his predecessors, it is probable that he owed more to their co-operation than to the high degree of their development. It is a common error to suppose that the intellectual powers which make the poet or the historian are essentially different from those which make the man of science. Powers of observation, however acute, could never make a scientific discoverer; for discovery requires the creative effort of the imagination. The scientific man does not stumble upon new facts or conclusions by accident; he finds what he looks for. The problem before him is essentially similar to that of the historian who tries to create an accurate and complete picture of an epoch out of scattered records of contemporary impressions more or less true, and none wholly true. Fertility of imagination is absolutely essential for that step from the less to the more perfectly known which we call discovery.