we should know which hypothesis in each case it is best to keep in mind; -to ascertain which, in respect to the subject in hand, was my only object in the paper laid before you. Then as to that unlucky, I must say very unlucky, analogy of gravitation. I say very unlucky, not because I disbelieve gravitation any more than I did, but because that part of my paper has been so absolutely misunderstood. It has been dealt with as if I made a distinct comparison between gravitation and Darwinism, and used the one in some way to support the other. (Hear, hear.) What have I done? I have done this;-I had occasion to employ four technical terms, each capable of very large and diverse use, and I wanted every one to understand exactly what I meant by those terms. I thought, How shall I do this? Lawyers, I believe, are finding out that it is wiser, instead of attempting to frame precise definitions, rather to give illustrations; and so I thought I would do the same, and illustrate rather than define the meaning I assigned to these technical terms. I had in my head two illustrations equally adapted to my purpose— the one I actually used, of gravitation, and the one which Mr. Mitchell (who though he hates hypotheses, yet sometimes uses them with good effect) gave us the other evening about meteors. I distinctly thought of putting that in as my illustration. Clearly then for Mr. Reddie to go through the various points in which he thought there was a resemblance between Darwinism and gravitation was throwing time away. Let me quote the exact words I used about this illustration of gravitation. I said: "The precise meaning to be attached to these terms, and the value to be set upon the tests they denote, may be best seen by a simple example." I pass by, therefore, all that Mr. Reddie has said about these terms as applied to gravitation. They have nothing to do with what I have said. They are interesting to those who want to go into the subject of gravitation, but they have nothing whatever to do with Darwinism. Then as to Neptune, what was the point I was arguing? It was this-It is perfectly conceivable that there may be a flaw in our evidence concerning any explanation of a phenomenon, which arises, not from a real absence of evidence, but from our being unable to get at it. Every theologian puts it down as one of the canons of criticism that whenever a possible explanation of any contradiction between passages of Scripture can be given, although you cannot prove one iota of that explanation to be true, the force of the objection is thereby destroyed, since it is shown that there may be, after all, no contradiction at all. I say that principle is laid down by theological advocates as one of the primary canons of criticism. I believe the canon is a true one in science also, though I do not say that when such flaws in the evidence exist, the hypothesis stands on the same level as before. Let me read my words again on that point. I said: "It is plain, then, that no objection to a hypothesis should be regarded as of final weight for which a possible explanation can be given not inconsistent with observed facts. Weaken the credibility of the hypothesis such objections can and do; destroy it altogether they cannot." And I submit, however much the thing may be laughed at, that so long as the fact remains that a planet could exist, and could roll round the sun, without being possibly visible

to us, any perturbations which could be explained on the supposition of such a planet existing would be no absolute disproof of gravitation—

The CHAIRMAN.-Except that no one has told us that such a thing is possible as a revolving planet which should not reflect light.

Mr. WARINGTON.-If you take so simple a substance as lampblack, and properly prepare it, you will find it reflects no light at all

The CHAIRMAN.-Newton found nothing like this in his experiments. Mr. WARINGTON.-Well, as to the total absence of reflection, I may be straining the matter too far; but of this I feel sure, that were there a planet coated with lampblack at the distance of Neptune, it would be invisible to us, and that would answer my purpose quite as well—

The CHAIRMAN.-I should consider things like that to be among the improbabilities of nature.

Mr. WARINGTON.-Now see what has been the result of this misunderstanding about my illustration. Not only has Mr. Reddie gone out of his way to refute universal gravitation, but he has entirely missed the real object of the illustration; and so when he comes to use the terms technically, as I used them, and in reference to my paper, it is in a totally different sense, just because he has been so absorbed in refuting, as he thought, the substance of what I said about gravitation, as entirely to overlook its true bearing on the matter in hand as an illustration of my meaning in the use of these terms. Then in Mr. Reddie's remarks about my definition of "species," there is again unfairness. Mr. Reddie writes thus, quoting my definition: "A species is a race of living beings possessing common characteristic differences from all others, which differences at the present time are constant and inherent." In the next sentence he leaves out the word "differences," and tells you, "It is admitted that at the present time the characteristics of species are constant and inherent." I said nothing of the kind. Then what use does Mr. Reddie make of this? He says that the proposition I put forward is inharmonious, because my definition of species contradicts the theory. (Hear, hear.) Is there any contradiction? No. I have not said that all the characteristics of the plant or animal are constant and inherent, but that the characteristic differences of the species are so-a very different thing indeed. To give an illustration: Heat and light are convertible things; no one would dispute it for an instant. You can change light into heat, or heat into light

Mr. REDDIE.—I must dispute it. You may do it sometimes, but not always. As a rule, you cannot.

Mr. WARINGTON.-I simply say the thing can be done. If, now, I wanted to define heat, I should certainly put in my definition some clause excluding light; and if I wanted to define light, I should in like manner exclude heat; and I should say that these points constitute the characteristic differences of light and heat. I should also say they are constant and inherent-that they cannot change; for if they change, then the heat is no longer heat, the light no longer light. (Hear, hear.) So with species: if the characteristics of species vary and are uncertain, then those characteristics thereby at once cease to be

specific. That is really all I have said about species; and no one, I should have thought, could have imagined I meant to say that the characteristics of species regarded in themselves were invariable. Then we come to another misunderstanding. I used the term "made." Mr. Reddie quotes me, and substitutes the word "created," placing it between inverted commas, as if the exact word I used. Now I use the terms "made" and "created" in two different senses. It may be wrong to make such a distinction; but when I say "created," I mean created in the first place, not out of anything that existed before; and when I say "made," I mean made out of something which did exist before. I do not at all assert that the words in the Hebrew bear out the distinction, but it is good to have two words thus distinct in sense. I said, therefore, "We believe that all living things we now see about us were made by God." I do not say created; and I never said God created all living things at the present time. I could not say so—

Rev. Dr. IRONS.-Forgive me, but as a matter of fact, I do not think you are fairly representing Mr. Reddie's argument on this point.

Mr. REDDIE.-As it is so late, I did not wish to interrupt Mr. Warington ; but I cannot admit any of these various interpretations of my arguments; and I must appeal to my paper.

Mr. WARINGTON.-Then as to the question itself, whichever word we use, I want to know whether it is not as true, "philosophically," that God made me as that God made Adam? If I look to the only authority we have to appeal to upon a matter of this kind-Scripture-I find David says that he was "fearfully and wonderfully made," and does not herein look to Adam, but to himself; for if you look at the context, you find he is referring distinctly to his own individual creation or making, or whatever you call it; and I say it is a simple truth that God made all living beings we see around us; and how? I say He made them (I will quote the exact words, for I do not wish to run away from what I have said): By means and under the influence of the causes involved in Darwinism." What means? By reproduction

Mr. REDDIE.-Adam?

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Mr. WARINGTON.-Do we see Adam about us? I never said all living species, but that all living things we see at the present time have been made by reproduction, and whatever variations they have, they have got them in the same way which Darwin lays down in his theory. Now how is this phrase, that all living beings were made by God in this way-how is this understood? It is said to be an incredible assertion, because " we know nothing of the transmutation of species." I never said we did know that existing species are the transmuted descendants of others, but simply that by inheritance and reproduction they are what they are. Carry the same principle backwards, and you have nothing more nor less than Darwinism; and I say if production in this manner be thus in harmony with God's present mode of acting, there is no possible reason why He should not have acted in this way also in the past. Then again (I am sorry to be obliged to go into such detail, but there really is no other way of meeting the paper), we come in the next paragraph to another

misuse of my words. Mr. Reddie says: "I must exclude from my definition -again using Mr. Warington's words-' all mere transient sports or temporary variations,' as well as 'all apparent varieties dependent upon situation, climate, &c."" I have had considerable difficulty in making out the meaning here, but as far as I can make it out,* it is that we must exclude from the definition of the causes involved in Darwinism all mere transient sports or variations from climate. That is what I understand by Mr. Reddie's remark. It is certainly not at all that which was conveyed by my words. I have simply said, because now and then a sport occurs in any species, introducing transient variation in some characteristic, that is no reason for regarding that characteristic as not specific; but I never said you are to exclude such things from the definition of what Darwinism is. Now we have a most extraordinary way of dealing with Darwinism. We are told "these may be Mr. Warington's deductions from Mr. Darwin's book or Mr. Darwin's own views ;-but hear what Dr. Louis Büchner says." If any one else adopt Dr. Büchner's theory, it is not Darwin. When Creation is denied in toto, that is Büchnerism, not Darwinism. Dr. Louis Büchner, having extraordinary opinions as to what God is, comes to certain strange conclusions. Darwin has, so far as we know, no such opinions, and does not come to such conclusions

The CHAIRMAN.-The same conclusion arrived at by Büchner--that of the self-evolving powers of nature-was, I believe, used in Essays and Reviews, and has been accepted by Darwin as a philosophical interpretation of his theory. I believe Darwin has never repudiated this as being a fair deduction from his own theory.

Mr. WARINGTON.-I wish to quote Darwin from his own book, fourth edition, the last sentence: "There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed by the Creator into a few forms or into one."-(P. 577.) Does not that settle the matter that he holds to Creation? The phrase still stands just as it did; it has not been expunged, and there is no attempt to change or modify its force. Then Mr. Reddie says Darwinism "plus Deity" may be possible. Now what is Mr. Reddie discussing? Not Darwinism "pure and simple," which is Darwinism and Deity; but Darwinism minus Deity, which is

I think reference to my words (p. 74) will show that I am not there professing to define Darwinism in Mr. Warington's language; but that, having bona fide adopted his words, I am defending my own argument, where I admit the kind of effects Mr. Darwin lays stress upon, without admitting the extent to which he assumes they operate in nature, while he ignores those limits of Nature's laws of which we have knowledge. I say, therefore, that if we 66 exclude all mere transient sports" and "temporary variations," &c., we are then restricted to "characteristics" (or "characteristic differences," which I consider precisely the same in meaning), which are constant and inherent at the present time;" and if constant and inherent now, so we must conclude they were "in the past ;" and if so, that this is contrary to the whole theory of Darwinian modifications or changes, and "the origin of species." I hope this explanation will make my argument quite free from misunderstanding. -J. R.

a false quantity, and not what Darwin ever set forth. We come now to another misrepresentation as to the consistency of Darwinism. We are told by Mr. Reddie, "Mr. Warington thinks it the severest possible test to require that a theory should apparently agree with the facts or phenomena it has been invented expressly to account for." I have said nothing of the kind. I said that in the particular case of Darwinism this test happened to be to my mind the severest; and why? Not because this test is, as a rule, the severest, but because in the case of Darwinism the field which it covers is so enormous that it is practically the severest test. But the impression is conveyed by Mr. Reddie as if I laid it down as an axiom for all theories. Then as to geology, it is asserted that I have said the theory does not need geological evidence. I never said a syllable of the kind. We have not got such evidence complete; there is no hope of getting it complete; and it is certain that if such transformations are going on at the present time, we should not get evidence of it in the geological strata now forming. I do not say that the evidence of geology would not be an excellent test of Darwinism if we had it complete, but we have not got it thus complete, and therefore must dispense with it. (Hear, hear.) Now we come to the matter of design. I have used a phrase which has been twisted and turned all manner of ways: "A symmetry and manifest method strongly suggestive of especial design and arbitrary plan." What was I referring to? Was I referring to what we call organs of designs, i. e., organs in different beings fitted to the life of those beings? No; I was referring to classification only; and I said if living beings had not been connected in the peculiarly natural manner in which they are, but in a more arbitrary manner, it would have been suggestive of especial design; we should have thought of them as having been arbitrarily marked out by some one who planned exactly where they should be. If I go, for instance, into a flower garden, with the flowers artistically arranged in rows and plots, there is evidence at once of an arbitrary plan which shows special design; but if I go to a bank of wild flowers, with all the flowers mingled anyhow, I see there no special design of the same kind, no arbitrary plan, no parting out in rows and plots: the flowers have grown naturally. I say, then, so far as classification goes, there is nothing in the connection of species with species, and group with group, which evinces arbitrary plan suggestive of special design, but rather the whole classification is purely natural. Then we have something about there being no struggle for existence at first, because there were few beings. Of course not. These beings would, however, certainly multiply, and then the struggle for existence would begin, but I never said that it always existed. Then as to orchids and insects, I never said they did not come into existence at the same time. Darwin would tell you that, upon his hypothesis, when the orchids came the insects came, because one was necessary to the other, and could not exist without it. Then we come to what is made a very grave objection, that Darwin converts the exception into the rule. Nothing of the kind. Darwin never says variation is the rule; he says, on the contrary, that he regards it as the exception. But he says this, that when variation does come it will very