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The Pamphlet Collection of Sir Robert Stout: Volume 30

The Heredity of an Ego. No. 1

The Heredity of an Ego. No. 1.

In the First Part the explanation abruptly discontinued is now resumed by pointing out that behind the House is the Malt-loft, and in the distance the Priest's house and the chapel, in which the culminating event of the narrative was solemnized, but which as we are using the subject as the analysis of heredity, we assume an additional sequence to the text, as of the birth of a son, who will display the influences derived from his peculiar prenatal impressionment.

Judging from the distant hills (which I am sorry to say are very coarsely represented in the zincotype copy from my drawing) the locality might be Yorkshire, and the physique of the farmer would compare with the reputationed York-shireman, who has somehow come to identify himself as the original obstinate, push-forward, unhesitating, and unvacillating character of John Bull; even the boy stands in stability. Looking attentively at the picture, you will perceive a glow of placid content as of summer afternoonativeness permeating the atmosphere.

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The Pantomimic.—"Behold the mansion swift, upreared by Jack." Of course in the Pantomime the House had to be swiftly presented, and as swiftly withdrawn, but the House that Jack built was the intended of invincibility against centuries.

The Philosophical.—Jack is of course the familiar appellation of John Bull, and the House that John Bull has built represents the possessions of the British Empire. So the British Empire enters as the influence of ancestry in the Heredity of the anticipatory Circumstance.