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