When I wrote Life and Habit (originally published in 1877) I said in
slightly different words:--

"Shall we say that a baby of a day old sucks (which involves the
whole principle of the pump and hence a profound practical knowledge
of the laws of pneumatics and hydrostatics), digests, oxygenizes its
blood--millions of years before anyone had discovered oxygen--sees
and hears, operations that involve an unconscious knowledge of the
facts concerning optics and acoustics compared with which the
conscious discoveries of Newton are insignificant--shall we say that
a baby can do all these things at once, doing them so well and so
regularly without being even able to give them attention, and yet
without mistake, and shall we also say at the same time that it has
not learnt to do them, and never did them before?

"Such an assertion would contradict the whole experience of
mankind."

I have met with nothing during the thirteen years since the
foregoing was published that has given me any qualms about its
soundness. From the point of view of the law courts and everyday
life it is, of course, nonsense; but in the kingdom of thought, as
in that of heaven, there are many mansions, and what would be
extravagance in the cottage or farm-house, as it were, of daily
practice, is but common decency in the palace of high philosophy,
wherein dwells evolution. If we leave evolution alone, we may stick
to common practice and the law courts; touch evolution and we are in
another world; not higher, nor lower, but different as harmony from
counterpoint. As, however, in the most absolute counterpoint there
is still harmony, and in the most absolute harmony still
counterpoint, so high philosophy should be still in touch with
common sense, and common sense with high philosophy.

The common-sense view of the matter to people who are not over-
curious and to whom time is money, will be that a baby is not a baby
until it is born, and that when born it should be born in wedlock.
Nevertheless, as a sop to high philosophy, every baby is allowed to
be the offspring of its father and mother.

The high-philosophy view of the matter is that every human being is
still but a fresh edition of the primordial cell with the latest
additions and corrections; there has been no leap nor break in
continuity anywhere; the man of to-day is the primordial cell of
millions of years ago as truly as he is the himself of yesterday; he
can only be denied to be the o