organ; and, in fine, shall get back to the original nebulosity, having left no crevice for teleology to creep through; and this would be contrary to Professor Huxley's own admission, that the teleologist can always defy the evolutionist to disprove that the primordial molecular arrangement was not intended to evolve the phenomena of the universe. The only reasonable alternative is to say, that there is purpose at every stage of the process, a double or multiplied purpose; that the eye of the fish is intended both to serve the purpose of the fish, and to be instrumental in the evolution of more perfected organs. The perfect steam-engine was preceded by the steam-engine in ruder forms; the inventive genius of man induced variations on the earlier forms; the forms best fitted to survive were selected by manufacturers, and in time gave birth to still higher forms. It could not be said of the existing steam-engine, that the man who effected the last improvement invented the engine, for it owes its birth to a preceding form; in like manner, the preceding form was not invented when it received the last touch, which made it what it was; and as to the inventor of the first rude form, if he and it could be discovered and defined, manifestly he did not invent the highly perfected engine of to-day. The steam-engine, therefore, has had no inventor: and yet there has been mind at every step! This analogy is good for what it is intended to show-viz., that a complex instrument like the human eye does not come into existence without the exercise of mind: and if it be objected that steam-engines are not begotten but invented the addition which constitutes the improvement always coming from without-the objection is not to the point. Moreover, the analogy does not fail even

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in the point indicated by the objection: for as the pattern of a previous engine is slavishly copied, where there is no inventive power to effect an improvement, so an animal can only transmit the characters it possesses unless variation is induced; and the ultimate cause of variation in a living structure, as well as in a steam-engine, is always from without. Should it be

said that the inventor of the first rude form of steamengine, say Hero of Alexandria, did not design or foresee the engine of to-day, the reply is, that the mental power exercised to effect each improvement has been of the same kind, or it would not be able to accept the work done by preceding minds, and build further upon the same foundation; and therefore it is all the same as though one human mind had first planned the engine, and afterwards invented all the successive improvements. If this latter mind be compared with the Divine mind there will be one obvious difference, arising from omniscience: when the end is seen from the beginning, the intermediate steps cannot be regarded as trials and experiments, but may be understood as necessary preparative processes, or as ends in themselves.1

Man, then, we may be allowed to say, was foreseen and intended from the first; and if this be so, how great the foresight to look onward through a hundred millions of years! How vast the wisdom which could touch the springs, and initiate the molecular motions which would set atom clashing with atom, and molecule combining with molecule, through millions of leagues of space, and millions of ages of time, to build up life from stage to stage, allowing for all outward conditions, and all

1 Huxley's attempted demolition of Paley's illustration of the watch (Lay Sermons, p. 301) is answered by the above argument.

inward actions, and the antagonism of species with species, till there should be evolved at last a creature having a bodily organization wondrously fitted together, and endowed with large capacities for knowledge and happiness! How great the patience which, because the process was a necessary preliminary, could touch the first springs and see the work begin, and calmly wait a hundred million years for the result! And even man, as he is at present, is not the last result-even now the end foreseen is not finally accomplished—but the Creator, while satisfied, we may suppose, that in the time now present the results are what they are, is waiting for the result that shall be

§ 2. Difficulties and Apparent Mistakes Explained. We accept Evolution because of its truth, and immediately find that truth has superior charms to error, possessing the master key which opens secret chambers, and reveals what had been mysteries. Certain facts of biology, which had been difficulties on every other hypothesis, looking like mistakes incompatible with creative wisdom, at once receive an explanation.

Evolution v. Special Creation.-Naturalists used to suppose that new species were miraculously originated in full-grown perfection; but the scene of the new creation was always placed in some region remote from human observation: nobody stood by as a witness while the elemental atoms flashed into living tissues, or an elephant descended from the sky. As Mr Spencer points out, the special creation of new species is inconceivable we can neither represent to our thoughts the

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creation of new matter out of nothing, nor the rushing together of a myriad atoms, previously dispersed through the neighbouring air and earth, and held in various chemical combinations. To assume a myriad supernatural impulses, differing in their directions and amounts, given to as many different atoms, is a multiplication of mysteries rather than the solution of a mystery. For every one of these impulses, not being the result of a force locally existing in some other form, implies the creation of force; and the creation of force is just as inconceivable as the creation of matter.1 But creation by evolution can be conceived.

Evolution teaches that all nature is so connected that a change in one thing implies a change in some other thing, if not in all other things; and so points the way to discovery, and opens up new and grand fields for research. Mr Wallace, after studying carefully the natural history of the Island of Celebes, expresses his belief that none of the phenomena, however apparently isolated or insignificant, can ever stand alone; that not the wing of

butterfly can change in form or vary in colour except in harmony with, and as a part of, the grand march of nature. The island stands in the very centre of the Malay Archipelago, surrounded with islets which seem. to afford the greatest facilities for communication with Borneo, Java, &c., and yet presents remarkable peculiarities in its productions. Among its zoological characteristics are a tailless ape, allied to the baboons; a straight-horned antelope of obscure affinities, but quite unlike anything else in the whole archipelago, or in India; and an altogether abnormal wild pig. In birds and insects it is equally peculiar, and a large number of

1 Principles of Biology, i. 337.

its butterflies are distinguished by superiority of size and a characteristic modification in the form of the wings, which stamp upon the most dissimilar insects a mark distinctive of their common birthplace. "What," asks the naturalist, "are we to do with phenomena such as these? Are we to rest content with the very simple, but, at the same time, very unsatisfying explanation, that all these insects and other animals were created exactly as they are, and originally placed exactly where they are, by the inscrutable will of their Creator, and that we have nothing to do but to register the facts and wonder? Was this single island selected for a fantastic display of creative power merely to excite a childlike and unreasoning admiration? Is all this appearance of gradual modification by the action of natural causes

-a modification the successive steps of which we can almost trace a delusion? Is this harmony between the most diverse groups-all presenting analogous phenomena, and indicating a dependence upon physical changes of which we have independent evidenceall false testimony? If I could think so, the study of nature would have lost for me its greatest charm. I should feel as would the geologist, if you could convince him that his interpretation of the earth's past history was all a delusion-that strata were never formed in the primeval ocean, and that the fossils he so carefully collects and studies are no true record of a former living world, but were all created just as they are, and in the rocks where he now finds them."1

The Theory of Evolution explains all the difficulties and anomalies referred to in the third chapter of this essay. As all organic beings, extinct and recent, which 1 Wallace: Natural Selection, p. 197.