Chapter VI: Part 6

The review containing the above passage did not appear till the present volume was on the very eve of publication. Even a hasty glance at Mr. Mivart’s book is sufficient to show that Mr. Bennett has not over-estimated its importance and value. It is scarcely possible here to do more than make a few reflections upon its general scope, in reply to the challenge offered to Darwinians. The first objection, as it stands in the summary, wears the appearance of a misconception. It is almost certain to produce one. When Mr. Darwin attributes the origin of species to Natural Selection, he includes expressly, and where not expressly, by obvious implication, the principle of Variability. He never maintains that the first or any subsequent stage of a useful structure can be produced by Natural Selection. Natural Selection only operates to preserve. Without Variation it would have no sphere in which to operate, so that from one point of view Mr. Darwin may be said to attribute the origin of species to Variation rather than Natural Selection. He is, moreover, far from ignoring the influence of other principles, such as Inheritance, Reversion, and Correlation, upon the total result. He may be thought inconsistent with himself in laying stress at times upon the minuteness of the variations which he supposes to have slowly accumulated into specific differences, and at other times admitting the sudden appearance of variations which may be considered as large ones, and which are certainly striking. But in the first instance the great and almost overwhelming difficulty was to induce a belief that forms specifically different could be connected with one another by descent. By showing that a multitude of small differences accumulated would make a large total difference, he made as it were a bridge for the existing incredulity. It now appears that the gulf may be passed with easy strides instead of the little slow steps at first thought necessary. This fortifies the doctrine of the Transmutation of Species, in proportion as there are fewer ‘missing links,’ fewer transitional forms that need to be accounted for.

Of ‘the coexistence of closely similar structures of diverse origin,’ illustrated so forcibly by the instance of the eye, ‘in at least three independent lines of descent, the Mollusca, the Annulosa, and the Vertebrata,’ it can scarcely be denied that Natural Selection alone would be an inadequate explanation. But here again it should be observed that Darwinism does not attribute everything to Natural Selection. It assumes, what must be allowed, that variations occur. In obedience to what laws those variations themselves are produced is an interesting speculation, and a most important subject of inquiry. That such laws or conditions of Variation exist no one can doubt, unless he has been seduced by Ovidian metamorphoses to believe in trees bleeding human blood and human foreheads branching with the antlers of the stag. A knowledge of those conditions might fully explain the coexistence of similar structures of diverse origin, consistently with the principle of Natural Selection. The ignorance of them is scarcely a proof that such coexistence does not harmonize with it.

The objection that giraffes, which profited by long necks in a time of drought, would find them a disadvantage subsequently, as requiring a greatly increased size and strength of muscles to support them, overlooks the law of correlation, by assuming that the elongated neck would be out of proportion to the other conditions of the creature’s fabric.

Mr. Mivart’s fourth objection seems at least an extremely improbable opinion. He refers to Mr. Darwin’s expression, that the goose appears to have a highly inflexible organization, as if he himself thought it possible for a species at length to attain to an organization completely inflexible. Such a view would imply two parents exactly like one another, producing offspring exactly like themselves; and of such exact likenesses no known families afford examples.

The seventh objection recalls the still unexplained physiological difference between ‘species’ and ‘races,’ unions between the former being sterile, and between the latter fertile. In this branch of the subject there is much scope still for inquiry. Some of the difficulty may be due to a trick played us by language. True species have been defined to be those that are not fertile together; and from the definition it follows that races which _are_ fertile together are not true species. But the question is obscured by the use of the two different words ‘races’ and ‘species,’ the real issue being, whether races that are and races that are not fertile together can originate in the same way. The subject in its other bearings has been largely discussed by Mr. Darwin in his work on ‘Animals and Plants under Domestication.’

It remains only to say a few words on the argument from the calculation of chances which is supposed to reduce the survival by natural selection of any particular useful variation almost or altogether to an arithmetical impossibility. ‘The advantage,’ we are told, ‘whatever it may be, is utterly outbalanced by numerical inferiority. A million creatures are born: ten thousand survive to produce offspring. One of the million has twice as good a chance as any other of surviving: but the chances are fifty to one against the gifted individual’s being one of the hundred survivors. No doubt the chances are twice as great against any one other individual, but this does not prevent their being enormously in favour of _some_ average individual[69].’ In this calculation it seems to be overlooked that every individual will vary more or less, and that out of a million variations there is a very great probability that _one_ should give much more than the amount of advantage which the calculation supposes. Nor does it follow that a variation conferring great advantage in the struggle for life should be great in comparison with a creature’s general organization. There is a very probable alternative, that when the advantages are exceedingly slight they may be shared by a great many, and that when falling to the lot of only one or a few, they may be exceedingly important. The doctrines of reversion and inheritance are pressed into the service of the arithmetical argument to show that the acquired advantage would be gradually diminished and finally lost. But Mr. Darwin tells us that, ‘when a new character appears, it is occasionally from the first well-fixed[70].’ The chances upon one principle that a character will not be transmitted are not worth consideration, if, under the operation of some other principle known or unknown, the transmission of the character actually takes place. We are asked whether one white man, introduced into an island otherwise inhabited only by negroes, would be likely to give the whole island eventually a white, or even a yellow, population. Without trying the experiment, we may perhaps safely answer in the negative. But the illustration loses much or all of its point, when we consider how little the circumstances of the experiment would correspond with what ordinarily happens in nature, how little we know whether the white man’s colour would be really an advantage or the reverse, and how complicated are the differences between a white man and a negro. If the blackness of the negro be due to Natural Selection in any considerable degree, we should expect it to suit the conditions which surround him in his native habitation better than a white skin would do. In this case the pallor introduced into the breed by a solitary stranger would gradually disappear in obedience to the principles of Natural Selection, not in opposition to them. To take once more the instance of the giraffe; the useful variation is here by hypothesis an elongated neck; it is conceivable that out of large herds the few survivors of a drought might be exclusively such as possessed this advantage to some extent. These would probably transmit to a large majority of their descendants the tendency to vary in a given direction which they had themselves all more or less exhibited. Their progeny, moreover, would be placed in exceptionally favourable circumstances by the very fact that in the previous drought so many of the same species had been starved to death, who would otherwise have furnished their chief competitors in the struggle for existence. It is still objected that upon this supposition many other animals ought to have acquired giraffe-like necks. But such an expectation is far from being warranted by the principles of Natural Selection. Since all variations are potentially useful, but only those are preserved which suit the surrounding conditions among which they are exhibited, the calculation of chances will itself plead for the probability that a variety of variations will be preserved, rather than the same many times over. Other species competing with the giraffe for food would be little likely to gain an advantage over it by a slight increase in length of neck, though by other variations they might achieve a decided superiority. It is obvious, also, that the advantage assigned to the elongated neck would belong to many other possible variations, such as a lengthened proboscis, far-reaching arms, the climbing powers of the snake or the monkey, the flight of the bird or the insect; all of which may be due to Natural Selection and the subsidiary principles which the theory of Development embraces.

The calling in of subsidiary principles may be thought to spoil the boasted simplicity of the theory. But such an opinion is hypercritical. One might truthfully say of a great patriot that all he did was in obedience to the simple law of duty, without implying that he was exempt from the law of association of ideas, or independent of the mechanical, chemical, and vital laws which regulate many of the functions of all human beings alike.

FOOTNOTES.

[1] These papers were read at various dates between February 1869 and January 1871, before the Torquay Natural History Society.

[2] Read before the Devonshire Association, July 1870.

[3] Horace, Odes, I. xvi. 13:--

Fertur Prometheus addere principi
Limo coactus particulam undique
Desectam, et insani leonis
Vim stomacho apposuisse nostro.

[4] Lyell, ‘Principles of Geology,’ vol. ii. p. 324. Tenth Edition.

[5] Darwin, ‘Animals and Plants under Domestication,’ vol. ii. p. 251.

[6] 1,073,741,824 grains.

[7] ‘On the Origin of Species,’ p. 74. Fourth Edition.

[8] Darwin, ‘Animals and Plants under Domestication,’ vol. ii. p. 379.

[9] 37 dwts. 7 grs., or 895 grs., between seven and eight times the size of the wild fruit. See ‘Animals and Plants under Domestication,’ vol. i. p. 356.

[10] Darwin, ‘Animals and Plants under Domestication,’ passim.

[11] ‘Animals and Plants under Domestication,’ vol. ii. pp. 348-351.

[12] An important caution may here be quoted from Mr. Herbert Spencer. ‘An impression,’ he says, ‘has been given by those who have popularized the sentiments of Embryologists, that, during its development, each higher organism passes through stages in which it resembles the adult forms of lower organisms--that the embryo of a man is at one time like a fish, and at another time like a reptile. This is not the fact. The fact established is, that up to a certain point the embryos of a man and a fish continue similar, and that then differences begin to appear and increase--the one embryo approaching more and more towards the form of a fish; the other diverging from it more and more. And so with the resemblances to the more advanced types.’--_Principles of Biology_, vol. i. p. 143.

[13] ‘Origin of Species,’ p. 270. Mr. Darwin shows how the hexagonal cells of the hive-bee can have arisen from the simple cylindrical form, by bringing the cylinders sufficiently near together, so that their outlines, if completed, would intersect.

The humble-bee makes separate and very irregular rounded cells.

The _melipona domestica_ makes cells that are nearly spherical, but too near together for the spheres to be complete, flat walls of wax being built where they tend to intersect.

A little extra regularity, advantageous for the saving of wax and labour, would produce the symmetrical comb of the hive-bee with its two layers of hexagonal prisms.

[14] See ‘Principles of Biology,’ vol. i. pp. 428-431.

[15] ‘Origin of Species,’ p. 213; ‘Principles of Biology,’ vol. i. pp. 392, 394. The walking-fishes of India and the mud-fishes of Ceylon and New Zealand are described in an interesting article by Dr. Day of Torquay, in ‘All the Year Round’ for June 11th, 1870. Dr. Day seems to think the climbing powers of the _anabas scandens_ less satisfactorily attested than other attributes of these extraordinary groups.

[16] Carpenter, ‘Animal Physiology,’ chap. 14.

[17] The design of this Essay was not, as has been erroneously supposed, to disprove the universality of the Deluge by help of Darwinism, but to remove one great obstacle to the general acceptance of Darwinism by disproving the universality of the Deluge. Taking the Theory of Development for granted, a recent universal Deluge would be too obviously impossible to need arguing against.

[18] Lyell, ‘Principles of Geology,’ ii. 332.

[19] Ibid. ii. 344.

[20] Lyell, ii. 336.

[21] ‘The Malay Archipelago,’ vol. ii. p. 448.

[22] ‘Genesis of the Earth and of Man,’ p. 117; quoted in Sir J. Lubbock’s ‘Prehistoric Times,’ p. 314.

[23] A religious and supremely orthodox poet of the last century enquires, ‘Where is the dust that has not been alive?’--Young, ‘Night Thoughts,’ Night IX, 1. 87.

[24] ‘Mushrooms and Toadstools.’--Worthington G. Smith, p. 17.

[25] ‘Genesis of the Earth and of Man,’ pp. 113, 114.

[26] Genesis, chap. xi.

[27] Sir John Lubbock, ‘Prehistoric Times,’ pp. 338, 346, 452; Herodotus, iv. 26.

[28] See Mill’s ‘History of British India,’ book ii. ch. i. and notes.

[29] ‘Prehistoric Man,’ Dr. Daniel Wilson, p. 101.

[30] ‘The Daughter of Galileo,’ by the author of ‘Mary Powell,’ p. 283.

[31] ‘Origin of Species,’ p. 268.

[32] ‘Good Words for the Young,’ June 1870. Animal Defences. By A. W. Drayson.

[33] Wallace, ‘Essays on Natural Selection,’ p. 227.

[34] ‘The Spectator,’ No. 120.

[35] ‘Spectator,’ No. 121.

[36] Nos. 156, 157.

[37] ‘Spectator,’ No. 519.

[38] ‘Natural History,’ § 985. ‘It is a common experience that dogs know the dog-killer; when, as in times of infection, some petty fellow is sent out to kill the dogs; and that though they have never seen him before, yet they will all come forth, and bark and fly at him.’

[39] See ‘Knight’s Half-Hours with the Best Authors.’ No. 185: from ‘The Fool of Quality.’

[40] ‘Essays on Natural Selection,’ p. 248.

[41] Ibid. p. 128.

[42] This Essay was originally prepared as a sermon for Trinity Sunday. For the text were quoted the well-known words of 2 Peter ii. 16, ‘The dumb ass, speaking with man’s voice, forbad the madness of the prophet.’ The design was to show that some of the most unpopular novelties in scientific opinion bore no necessary antagonism to the deepest mysteries of Christian doctrine. In regard to such an attempt it is perhaps needless to add that the kindliness of the design was not fully appreciated by those for whose benefit it was intended.

[43] As in the inscription ‘Jehu, the son of Omri,’ referred to by Lord A. C. Hervey, in Smith’s Dict. of the Bible, Art. ‘Genealogy.’

[44] Smith’s Dictionary of the Bible, Art. ‘Genealogy of Jesus Christ,’ Lord A. C. Hervey, referring to Dr. Mill. Compare also Hengstenberg, Genuineness of the Pentateuch, vol. ii. p. 294, Translation, 1847.

[45] Sir J. Lubbock, ‘Prehistoric Times,’ p. 502, second edition.

[46] Ibid. p. 223.

[47] Ibid. p. 233.

[48] See chapter on Marriage, in Sir J. Lubbock’s ‘Origin of Civilization.’

[49] Sir J. Lubbock, ‘Prehistoric Times,’ p. 380; Sir C. Lyell, ‘Antiquity of Man,’ p. 27.

[50] Lyell, ‘Elements of Geology,’ p. 118, ed. 1865.

[51] Messrs. Pengelly and Vivian, resident at Torquay, acting members of the distinguished committee of exploration.

[52] See Reports of British Association, 1868, p. 57, and 1869, p. 199, by W. Pengelly, Esq., F.R.S.

[53] This is the popular name for them. They do not petrify the specimens placed in them, but only coat them with stalagmite.

[54] The resuming process has not yet been adopted by the modern Fuegians, for Dr. Hooker informs us that at the extreme south of Tierra del Fuego, and in mid-winter, he has often seen the men lying asleep in their wigwams, without a scrap of clothing, and the women standing naked, and some with children at their breasts, in the water up to their middles gathering limpets and other shell fish, while the snow fell thickly on them and on their equally naked babies.’--Sir J. Lubbock, ‘Prehistoric Times,’ p. 532. Jerome declares that he had himself seen the Attacotti, a British tribe, eating human flesh. See Gibbon (vol. iii. p. 270, ed. 1854), who in several passages refers to the practice among various British tribes of going naked, especially in war, citing Appian, Ammianus, and Giraldus Cambrensis as his authorities for British customs. It will be remembered that Cæsar speaks even of the Southern Britons as fighting ‘omnibus membris expediti.’

[55] ‘Report of British Association, 1869,’ p. 201.

[56] Nov. 21, 1870.

[57] A formation later than the Devonian, and earlier than the New Red Sandstone.

[58] Revelation x. 6, Authorised Version.

[59] See Mr. Pengelly’s paper on the subject in the Transactions of the Devonshire Association for 1868.

[60] ‘Acadian Geology,’ Dawson, p. 386.

[61] See ‘Lecture on Coal,’ by W. Boyd Dawkins, Esq., M.A., F.R.S. Manchester, 1870.

[62] Address to the British Association, 1868, p. 66 of the Report.

[63] In the Collection of W. Pengelly, Esq., F.R.S.

[64] This and the three following letters were originally addressed to the Editor of the _Torquay Directory_, in answer to a gentleman who, in company with large multitudes of his fellow-Britons, both male and female, holds and upon occasion upholds a mass of opinions on Science and Religion, any one of which opinions individually may be right or may be wrong, but which, when held collectively, seem to my humble understanding to be logically incoherent.

[65] Reprinted from ‘Nature,’ No. 30.

[66] Reprinted from ‘Nature,’ No. 56.

[67] Applying to these caterpillars Mr. A Murray’s recent hypothesis for explaining ‘mimicry’ by hybridization, we should draw the poetical inference that a happy marriage is possible between a butterfly and a rose-bush.

[68] ‘Nature,’ No. 66.

[69] ‘Genesis of Species,’ p. 57, quotation (somewhat obscure as it stands) from the North British Review for June, 1867.

[70] ‘Animals and Plants under Domestication,’ vol. ii. p. 63.

INDEX.

Abiogenesis, note on hypothesis of, 126-132.

Addison, his opinion about Instinct, 71;
his description of the brood-hen, 72;
his account of a hen with brood of ducks, 73;
on the insensible gradations of species, 74.

African desert, geological evidence of, 122.

Anabas scandens, its climbing powers, 28;
Dr. Day’s opinion thereon, 28, note.

Androcles, story of, 82.

Animal mounds, of Wisconsin, 105.

Ants, slave-making, 29, 69;
French philosopher’s account of, 73.

Artificial selection, part of Natural selection, 16.

Baboons, warfare of, 69.

Bacon, Lord, his statement about dogs, 75.

Barbarism, time required for development of, 57.

Bees, progress of, in cell-making, 25;
their accuracy overrated, 69, 86.

Bennett, Mr. A. W., Mathematical test applied by, 168;
Review by, 173.

Birds’ nests, reasoning powers employed in construction of, 69, 86;
compared with human dwellings, 70;
use of human manufactures in, 71.

British Association, exploration of Kent’s cavern by, 109.

Britons, ancient, condition of, 111.

Brookes, Henry, story of a lion quoted from, 76.

Brutes, man’s treatment of, 11, 90;
opinion that God is the soul of, 71;
compared with men, 74;
their moral qualities, 75, 88;
their laws and constitutions, 77;
their perceptions and emotions, 80;
language of scripture about, 84;
motives of pleasure and pain applied to, 88;
children compared with, 89.

Cannibalism, 57;
of British tribes, 112.

Caterpillars, resembling twigs, 170.

Chalk, continuous formation of, 117.

Civilization, its dependence on language and the art of writing, 88.

Coal-measures, 119-121, 140.

Columbus, his opinion of the earth’s spherical form condemned,
60, 148.

Coquand’s Oysters of the Chalk, Professor Flower’s review
of, 145, 165.

Correlation, 17, 166, 176.

Creation, sudden, not reconcilable with the order of nature, 25;
theories of, compared, 32;
prejudice in favour of its suddenness, 63, 64;
Biblical theory of, 129.

Creations, many distinct, not warranted by scripture or science,
20, 116, 135;
special, for special localities, untenable, 21.

Danes, ancient, food and weapons of, 104.

Darwin, his account of the development of his theory, 4;
his calculation about elephants, 13;
allusion to his theory of Pangenesis, 33;
his explanation of the fauna and flora of mountain-tops, 46;
his account of slave-making ants, 69;
his treatment of geology, 134;
his chapter on instinct, 163.

Darwinism, 3-33;
obscurely anticipated, 2;
its supporters, 3;
prejudice against, 4, 152;
its bearing on the seeming imperfection of nature, 24;
inconsistent with a recent universal deluge, 31, 34.

Dawkins, Mr. W. Boyd, lecture on coal by, 143.

Dawson, Dr., Acadian Geology, 120, 140.

Day, Dr., paper by, on the Mud-fish and Anabas scandens, 28.

Denudation, 143.

Deucalion’s Flood, argument from rebutted, 150.

Development, theory of, by whom originated and supported, 4;
opinion of its absurdity, 6;
facts and principles necessary to, (variation, 7;
Inheritance and Reversion, 9;
struggle for life, 11;
antiquity of the globe, 30;
freedom of the globe from any recent universal catastrophe, 31);
application of, to human body and mind, 62, 95;
time required for, 122;
not materially affected by hypothesis of spontaneous
generation, 127.

Ducklings, experiment with, 73.

Earth, immense age of, required by Theory of Development, 30, 67;
proved by geology, 31, 54, 107, 121;
popular impression as to age of, 93, 121;
reckoned by millions of years, 123.

Egypt, its monuments, 51;
its chronology, 56, 101.

Elephant, its sagacity, 3;
its rate of breeding, 13;
its different species, 46;
its memory, 66;
epithet applied to it by Pope, 74;
in Devonshire, 112.

Esquimaux, their ignorance of arithmetic, 103.

Flint-tools, 109, 111, 113.

Flood, the Noachian, 34-61;
historical account of, 38;
explanation suggested, 41;
how consistent with Darwinism, 50;
traditions of a, 58;
no traces of its universality, 59.

Food, its influence on the animal and vegetable kingdoms, 12;
in the competition for life, 22.

Fossils, an evidence of variation, 20;
different in different strata, 116;
time required for vicissitudes of, 119;
necessary imperfection of, 134;
their scarcity and abundance, 141;
numerous chances of loss and destruction for, 146.

Fuegians, nakedness of, 112, _note_.

Galileo, his doctrine of the earth’s motion condemned, 60, 148.

Genesis, book of, its chronology, 55.

‘Genesis of Species,’ by Mr. Mivart, 173.

Geology, its conclusions, 31, 53;
imperfection of its record, 133-146.

Giraffes, 176, 179.

Glacial Period, its effect on distribution of species, 47.

Gooseberry, the big, 16.

Horse, career of, in America, 48;
its endurance and ambition, 3;
its intelligence, 66;
instance thereof, 74;
its intercourse with man, 80.

Hypotheses, use of, 131.

Inheritance, 9;
at different periods of life, 18.

Instinct, of bees, 25;
employment and gradations of, in various animals, 28;
compared with reason, 62-81, 164;
fallacious theory of, 67;
ignored by ducklings, 73;
fancied excellence of, 86.

Kent’s cavern, 109-115.

Language, time required for variations of, 57;
its influence on mankind, 77, 87;
origin of, 103.

Light, rapidity of, 97.

Limestone, formation of, 109;
contents of, 115;
slow formation of, 117;
Devonian, older than the New Red Sandstone, 118.

Lindley, Dr., his experiment with immersed vegetables, 143.

Linnæus, on the common descent of species, 3.

Lion, its generosity, 3;
instance of its affection, 76;
instance of its gratitude, 83;
in Britain, 112.

Locke, on the reason of brutes, 74.

Lubbock, Sir John, ‘Prehistoric Times,’ 54, 104, 107, 112;
‘Origin of Civilization,’ 107.

Lyell, Sir Charles, ‘Principles of Geology,’ 3, 54;
‘Antiquity of Man,’ 107;
‘Elements of Geology,’ 109.

Madagascar, its species and genera, 46.

Malay, compared with the Papuan by Mr. Wallace, 49, 150.

Man, his destructiveness, 11;
his likeness to other animals in blood, fibre, and skeleton, 29;
distribution of his varieties, 48;
traced back for thousands of years, 51;
a common origin for all families of, 52;
his chief endowments, 67;
compared as a builder with birds, 70;
his brain and hairless skin, 73;
his bodily structure, 85;
his opinion of war, 86;
real origin of, forgotten, 102.

Marriage-customs, slow change of, 106.

Marsupials, 46;
fossil, 47.

Matlock Bath, formation of stalagmite at, 110, 114.

Memory, necessary to intelligence, 66;
unequal distribution of, 66.

Miracles, treatment of false ones, 40;
of the Old Testament, 83.

Mivart, St. George, Mr., ‘Genesis of Species’ by, 173.

Mushroom, time required for its growth, 55.

Mygale, the trap-door spider, its ingenious nest, 29.

Natural Selection, illustrated by artificial selection, 14;
the slowness of its movement, 18;
explains the order of nature, and in part its seeming disorder, 26;
limits of, propounded by Mr. Wallace, 62.

Nile, articles in sediment of, 108.

Origin of life, opinions on, 94.

Oysters, memory of, 66;
obscure politics of, 77.

Palæontology, Lyell’s definition of, 135.

Papuan, compared with the Malay, 49, 150.

Parfitt, Mr., on Fossil Sponge Spicules, 136, 139.

Pengelly, Mr., on pre-historic man, 105;
exploration of Kent’s cavern by, 109, 110, 113.

Pigeons, subjected to man’s selection, 14, 16, 17.

Plants, their struggle for food, 12;
their movements, 28.

Pope, his epithet for the elephant, 74.

Reason, progressive development of, in individual minds, 62, 67;
that of men, one in kind with the intelligence of brutes, 66, 84;
helps to, 86.

Relative terms, 97, 171.

Religion, development of, 64, 90.

Reversion, 9;
limits artificial selection, 17.

Rudimentary organs, 21.

Sandstone, New Red, 118.

Savages, question of their degeneracy, 57;
brain, skin, and voice of, 78.

Science, not antagonistic to Christian doctrine, 82, _note_.

Scripture, no warrant for distinct creations, 20;
does not profess to
teach Natural Science, 35;
its use of ordinary language, 36;
its historical account of the Flood, 38;
explanation thereof, 41;
disregard of secondary causes in, 83;
character of genealogies in, 99;
mistaken quotation of, 124;
invidious connection of, with false science, 151;
supposed opposition between it and Darwinism, 157.

Species, permanence of, 9;
some benefited by change of habitat, 21;
variations of, how advantageous, 27;
difficulty of collecting all for the Ark, 43;
distribution of, 45.

Spencer, Mr. Herbert, his caution about embryonic forms, 19, _note_;
his accurate phrase, ‘Survival of the fittest,’ 154;
his ‘Principles of Biology,’ 161.

Sponges, not to be hurried, 117;
range of in geology, 136;
final cause of, 138.

Stalagmite, thickness of in Kent’s cavern, 110;
time required for forming, 113;
dates carved upon, 115.

Stratification, uniform order of, 116, 122.

Struggle for life, 11;
great fecundity useful to a species in, 24.

Sylvia Sutoria, the tailor-bird, its nest, 29.

Tails, rudimentary, in man, 22, 155.

Tennyson, language of ‘the Brook’ in, 125.

Theories, when to be accepted, 18.

Thought, time required for, 64;
movement of, depending on language, 87.

Time, immense duration of, required by the Theory of Natural
Selection, 30, 67;
lapse of, 93-125;
(see _Earth_, age of);
inexhaustible, 98, 125.

Tinière, delta of, 107.

Tyndal, Professor, on ‘The Minuteness of Waves of Light,’ 97.

Usher, archbishop, Bible-chronology of, 99, 110.

Variability, 7;
objection to, considered, 128.

Vertebrate, the first, how originated, 158;
type of, supposed to be connected with cuttle-fish, 161;
definition of, investigated, 161.

Vivian, Mr., exploration of Kent’s cavern by, 109.

Wallace, Mr., his originality recognized, 5;
his opinion of the limits of Natural Selection, 62;
his exposure of fallacious views about Instinct, 67;
his theory of birds’ nests, 69;
his comparison of birds with men as builders, 70;
his speculation about the brain of the savage, 78.

War, in the animal and vegetable kingdoms, 12;
combination of baboons for, 69;
comparison of man and other animals engaged in, 86.

Wasps, their defensive weapon, 25;
materials used by, 86.

Whewell, Dr., his remark on Scientific Phraseology, 160.

Writing, invention of, 103.

Transcriber’s Notes

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End of Project Gutenberg's Essays on Darwinism, by Thomas R. R. Stebbing