ABSTRACT
Writing was chosenas the subject with which to introduce the contrast between physical heredity and social heredity because the history of this art is fairly complete and its acquisition by individuals can be readily studied. From some points of view it would have been more defensible to have begun with language. Children acquire language long before they learn to write. In this respect, they follow the history of the race. It is impossible to conceive of any human community, however primitive, which does not owe such solidarity as it has to language. The difficulty of making language the first topic of treatment is, however, directly related to its fundamental character and its early appearance as a phase of human life. Science has no means of studying the origins of language directly; it must depend largely on inference because the origins of language are lost in remote antiquity.
