On the Genesis of Species Part 31

[218] "Animals and Plants under Domestication," vol. ii. p. 403.

[219] Ibid. p. 366.

[220] "Animals and Plants under Domestication," vol. ii. p. 402.

[221] See _Fortnightly Review_, New Series, vol. iii. April 1868, p. 352.

[222] This appeared in the _Rivista Contemporanea n.a.z.ionale Italiana_, and was translated and given to the English public in _Scientific Opinion_ for September 29, October 6, and October 13, 1869, pp. 365, 391, and 407.

[223] See _Scientific Opinion_, of October 13, 1869, p. 407.

[224] See _Scientific Opinion_ of September 29, 1869, p. 366.

[225] _Fortnightly Review_, New Series, vol. iii. April 1868, p. 508.

[226] _Scientific Opinion_, of October 13, 1869, p. 408.

[227] _Fortnightly Review_, New Series, vol. iii. April 1868, p. 509.

[228] "Histoire Naturelle, generale et particuliere," tome ii. 1749, p.

327. "Ces liqueurs seminales sont toutes deux un extrait de toutes les parties du corps," &c.

[229] See _Nature_, March 3, 1870, p. 454. Mr. Wallace says (referring to Mr. Croll's paper in the _Phil. Mag._), "As we are now, and have been for 60,000 years, in a period of low eccentricity, _the rate of change of species during that time may be no measure of the rate that has generally obtained in past geological epochs_."

[230] "Habit and Intelligence," vol. i. p. 344.

[231] If anyone were to contend that beside the opium there existed a real distinct objective ent.i.ty, "its soporific virtue," he would be open to ridicule indeed. But the const.i.tution of our minds is such that we cannot but distinguish ideally a thing from its even essential attributes and qualities. The joke is sufficiently amusing, however, regarded as the solemn enunciation of a mere truism.

[232] Noticed by Professor Owen in his "Archetype," p. 76. Recently it has been attempted to discredit Darwinism in France by speaking of it as "_de la science mousseuse!_"

[233] "Lay Sermons," p. 342.

[234] Introductory Lecture of February 14, 1870, pp. 24-30, Figs. 1-4.

(Churchill and Sons.)

[235] See especially "Animals and Plants under Domestication," vol. ii.

chap. xviii.

[236] "Origin of Species," 5th edition, pp. 323, 324.

[237] "Animals and Plants under Domestication," vol. ii. p. 2.

[238] Ibid. p. 25.

[239] Ibid. p. 151.

[240] Ibid. p. 157.

[241] Ibid. p. 158.

[242] "Animals and Plants under Domestication," vol. i. p. 291.

[243] Though hardly necessary, it may be well to remark that the views here advocated in no way depend upon the truth of the doctrine of Spontaneous Generation.

[244] Vol. iii. p. 808.

[245] This is hardly an exact representation of Mr. Darwin's view. On his theory, if a favourable variation happens to arise (the external circ.u.mstances remaining the same), it will yet be preserved.

[246] See 2nd edition, p. 113.

[247] "Essays, Philosophical and Theological," Trubner and Co., First Series, 1866, p. 190. "Every relative disability may be read two ways. A disqualification in the nature of thought for knowing _x_ is, from the other side, a disqualification in the nature of _x_ from being known. To say then that the First Cause is wholly removed from our apprehension is not simply a disclaimer of faculty on our part: it is a charge of inability against the First Cause too. The dictum about it is this: 'It is a Being that may exist out of knowledge, but that is precluded from entering within the sphere of knowledge.' We are told in one breath that this Being must be in every sense 'perfect, complete, total--including in itself all power, and transcending all law' (p. 38); and in another that this perfect and omnipotent One is totally incapable of revealing any one of an infinite store of attributes. Need we point out the contradictions which this position involves? If you abide by it, you deny the Absolute and Infinite in the very act of affirming it, for, in debarring the First Cause from self-revelation, you impose a limit on its nature. And in the very act of declaring the First Cause incognizable, you do not permit it to remain unknown. For that only is unknown, of which you can neither affirm nor deny any predicate; here you deny the power of self-disclosure to the 'Absolute,' of which therefore something is known;--viz., that nothing can be known!"

[248] Loc. cit. p. 108.

[249] Loc. cit. p. 43.

[250] Loc. cit. p. 46.

[251] Mr. J. Martineau, in his "Essays," vol. i. p. 211, observes, "Mr.

Spencer's conditions of pious wors.h.i.+p are hard to satisfy; there must be between the Divine and human no communion of thought, relations of conscience, or approach of affection." ... "But you cannot const.i.tute a religion out of mystery alone, any more than out of knowledge alone; nor can you measure the relation of doctrines to humility and piety by the mere amount of conscious darkness which they leave. All wors.h.i.+p, being directed to what is _above_ us and transcends our comprehension, stands in presence of a mystery. But not all that stands before a mystery is wors.h.i.+p."

[252] "Lay Sermons," p. 20.

[253] Loc. cit. p. 109.

[254] Loc. cit. p. 111.

[255] In this criticism on Mr. Herbert Spencer, the Author finds he has been antic.i.p.ated by Mr. James Martineau. (See "Essays," vol. i. p. 208.)

[256] Loc. cit. p. 29.

[257] The Author means by this, that it is _directly_ and _immediately_ the act of G.o.d, the word "supernatural" being used in a sense convenient for the purposes of this work, and not in its ordinary theological sense.

[258] The phrase "order of nature" is not here used in its theological sense as distinguished from the "order of grace," but as a term, here convenient, to denote actions not due to direct and immediate Divine intervention.

[259] "A Free Examination of Darwin's Treatise," p. 29, reprinted from the _Atlantic Monthly_ for July, August, and October, 1860.

[260] "Origin of Species," 5th edition, p. 571.

[261] "Animals and Plants under Domestication," vol. ii. p. 431.

[262] The Rev. Baden Powell says, "All sciences approach perfection as they approach to a unity of first principles,--in all cases recurring to or tending towards certain high elementary conceptions which are the representatives of the unity of the great archetypal ideas according to which the whole system is arranged. Inductive conceptions, very partially and imperfectly realized and apprehended by human intellect, are the exponents in our minds of these great principles in nature."

"All science is but the partial reflexion in the _reason of man_, of the great all-pervading _reason of the universe_. And thus the _unity_ of science is the reflexion of the _unity_ of nature, and of the _unity_ of that supreme reason and intelligence which pervades and rules over nature, and from whence all reason and all science is derived." (Unity of Worlds, Essay i., -- ii.; Unity of Sciences, pp. 79 and 81.) Also he quotes from Oersted's "Soul in Nature" (pp. 12, 16, 18, 87, 92, and 377). "If the laws of reason did not exist in nature, we should vainly attempt to force them upon her: if the laws of nature did not exist in our reason, we should not be able to comprehend them." ... "We find an agreement between our reason and works which our reason did not produce." ... "All existence is a dominion of reason." "The laws of nature are laws of reason, and altogether form an endless unity of reason; ... one and the same throughout the universe."

[263] In the same way Mr. Lewes, in criticising the Duke of Argyll's "Reign of Law" (_Fortnightly Review_, July 1867, p. 100), asks whether we should consider that man wise who spilt a gallon of wine in order to fill a winegla.s.s? But, because we should not do so, it by no means follows that we can argue from such an action to the action of G.o.d in the visible universe.

For the man's object, in the case supposed, is simply to fill the wine-gla.s.s, and the wine spilt is so much loss. With G.o.d it may be entirely different in both respects. All these objections are fully met by the principle thus laid down by St. Thomas Aquinas: "Quod si aliqua causa particularis deficiat a suo effectu, hoc est propter aliquam causam particularem impediantem quae continetur sub ordine causae universalis. Unde effectus ordinem causae universalis nullo modo potest exire." ... "Sicut indigestio contingit praeter ordinem virtutis nutritivae ex aliquo impedimento, puta ex grossitie cibi, quam necesse est reducere in aliam causam, et sic usque ad causam primam universalem. c.u.m igitur Deus sit prima causa universalis non unius generi tantum, sed universaliter totius entis, impossibile est quod aliquid contingat praeter ordinem divinae gubernationis; sed ex hoc ipso quod aliquid ex una parte videtur exire ab ordine divinae providentiae, quo consideratur secundam aliquam particularem causam, necesse est quod in eundem ordinem relabatur secundum aliam causam."--_Sum. Theol_. p. i. q. 19, a. 6, and q. 103, a. 7.