Transcriber’s Note: Italics are enclosed in _underscores_. Additional
notes will be found near the end of this ebook.
MR. BELLOC STILL OBJECTS
MR. BELLOC
STILL OBJECTS
TO MR. WELLS’S “OUTLINE OF HISTORY”
BY
HILAIRE BELLOC
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PUBLISHERS AND IMPORTERS]
328–330 STOCKTON ST. SAN FRANCISCO, CAL.
1927
Made and Printed in Great Britain at
_The Mayflower Press_, _Plymouth_. William Brendon & Son, Ltd.
CONTENTS
PAGE
INTRODUCTION vii
I. MR. WELLS’S GENERAL GRIEVANCES 1
II. MR. WELLS AS BIOLOGIST 12
III. MR. WELLS’S IGNORANCE OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH 22
IV. MY ERRORS 28
V. MR. WELLS SHIRKS 36
VI. THE GREAT ROSY DAWN 40
INTRODUCTION
Mr. H. G. Wells brought out some time ago an _Outline of History_, the
object of which was to deny the Christian religion.
I examined this production for the benefit of my co-religionists in the
columns of certain Catholic papers. I did full justice to Mr. Wells’s
talents as a writer, but I exposed his ill acquaintance with modern
work on Biology, with early Christian writing and tradition, with
Christian doctrine itself: and, in general, his incompetence.
Stung by this exposure, Mr. Wells has just brought out against me a
small pamphlet, under the title of _Mr. Belloc Objects to the “Outline
of History.”_ It is an excited, popular, crude attack, full of personal
insult and brawling, and ample proof that he is hit. But it is
singularly weak in argument, confused in reply, and, as I shall show
in a moment, shirks nine-tenths of the very damaging criticism which I
directed against his book.
That book denies a creative God. There is no God, the Father
Almighty, Creator of Heaven and Earth. The Incarnation is a myth; the
Resurrection a falsehood; the Eucharist a mummery.
Probably Mr. Wells is thus infuriated, not only at being exposed, but
also because he cannot understand how such an assault upon religious
truth should possibly provoke resentment; yet I think I can explain the
thing to him by a parable.
Supposing (it is mere hypothesis) that a man were to attack the Royal
Family, and His Majesty in particular, jeering at the functions which
monarchy performs for the State and holding up the King of England to
contempt.
Mr. Wells would be the first to admit that a man so misbehaving
himself would receive very hard knocks indeed. He would be called
severely to account on all sides. It would be said that his spite arose
from some personal grievance against the Great; that he thus relieved
his soreness at feeling himself socially neglected, and so on. He might
justify himself as a martyr in the cause of political duty, but he
would be a fool if he did not look out for squalls.
Now the great and fundamental truths of the Christian religion are
still sacred to quite a number of Mr. Wells’s fellow-citizens,
including myself. Our attachment to them is at least as strong as
the loyalty of the average Englishman to the Royal Family; and if he
attacks them by way of _History_--making out that _History_ disproves
the Christian religion--then it is not, as he seems to imagine, an
outrage; but, on the contrary, a natural and inevitable consequence
that he should be taken to task, and his competence for writing history
severely examined.
I propose to reply in this pamphlet, not because I have any intention
of being drawn into a slanging match with a writer who is my superior
in this form of art, but because no challenge to Truth must be allowed
to pass unheeded. So far from imitating Mr. Wells, I shall take care
when I publish--as I do in a few weeks--my whole book, entitled _A
Companion to Mr. Wells’s “Outline of History,”_ to go carefully over
my text and to cut out anything which could be construed into mere
personal attack; though I shall preserve, of course, and even add
to, the due and often severe criticism which Mr. Wells deserves for
pretending to teach others on the basis of his own most insufficient
instruction.
I should, no doubt, greatly increase the circulation of this little
pamphlet of mine were I to season it with those offensive references
to personal habits and appearance which are now fashionable between
contemporaries. But I do not aim at any large circulation, beyond that
reasonable amount which will secure my being heard by the people whose
attention is worth having.
Invective such as Mr. Wells substitutes for argument is wholly
irrelevant. When you are discussing the competence of a man to write
history, it is utterly meaningless to throw about the jeers of the
gutter on his dress, accent or any other private detail concerning him.
If you discover a man pretending to write about Roman antiquity and yet
wholly blind to the effect of Latin literature, you rightly point out
his ignorance. But it is not to the purpose to accuse him of having a
round face or a thin voice. Indeed, were invective my object (which it
most certainly is not), I should rather have answered in verse as being
the more incisive and enduring form.
If it be a test of literary victory over an opponent to make him foam
at the mouth, then I have won hands down; but I do not regard Mr. Wells
as my opponent, nor am I seeking any victory. I am simply taking a book
which proposes to destroy the Faith of Christian men by the recital of
pretended history, and showing that the history is bad. While praising
many qualities in the book, I point out with chapter and verse that the
history is uninformed. That is my point and my only point.
Now that I have made it, I hope, quite clear that I am neither
interested in Mr. Wells’s personalities nor intend to go one better
upon them, but to deal strictly with things capable of argument and
intelligent examination, let us cut the cackle and come to the horses.
* * * * *
Mr. Wells’s pamphlet against me, to which I am here replying, is a
web of six elements. These are not put in any regular order, and the
author himself would probably not be capable of analysing them; but
a competent critic has no difficulty in separating them one from the
other.
They are:--
_First_: A number of shrill grievances on general grounds. For
instance, that though I have praised him highly I have not praised him
highly enough; that where I had to blame him I have used adjectives
upon his work such as “confused,” “ignorant,” which were not warranted;
that in general he is an ill-used fellow, and is moved to complain most
bitterly.
_Secondly_: He violently (and this is the main gist of all his
pamphlet) assaults me for pointing out that his statement of Darwinian
Natural Selection as the chief agent of evolution is antiquated
stuff, exploded, and proves him quite unacquainted with modern work.
Here he jeers at me as putting on a pose of special learning, and
_challenges me to quote any modern authorities substantiating my
criticism_. He calls my argument fantastic, a thing made up out of my
own head, without any authority from competent biologists. He denies
the existence of any such group of modern men of science opposed to
Darwinian Natural Selection. It is an amazing thing that his ignorance
should reach such a level as that, but it does. And it is there I am
going to hammer him.
_Thirdly_: There runs all through the little pamphlet, and still more
through the book itself, a startling ignorance upon the Catholic
Church, and in particular the idea that the Church is opposed to
scientific work, even such elementary science as Mr. Wells attempts to
expound.
_Fourthly_: He complains that I have in certain specific points misread
his meaning, misstated his conclusions or affirmations, and made errors
myself in attempting to correct his. He brings, it is true, no more
than three specific allegations; three out of a total of I know not
how many score, in a body of work which catches him up and exposes him
over and over again. Nevertheless, such as they are, being specific
allegations, however few, they must in justice be met; and I will here
meet them.
_Fifthly_: (and most significant): There is the embarrassed silence of
Mr. Wells’s pamphlet: his inability to meet nine-tenths of the points I
have brought against him, and his discreet shirking all mention of them.
_Sixthly_: The book ends with Mr. Wells’s usual glorious vision of a
glorious Millennium contrasted with the sad blindness of Catholics in
general, and myself in particular, to this approaching Seventh Monarchy.
I will deal with these six matters which build up Mr. Wells’s pamphlet,
taking them in the order I have given.
I
MR. WELLS’S GENERAL GRIEVANCES
I cannot pretend in so short a pamphlet as this to deal with all the
separate lamentations with which Mr. Wells has filled the air. But I
can state the principal of them, and try to make him understand how
wrong-headed he is in his objections.
Of these general points, the first and, perhaps, most important is
that he was refused a right of reply. On page v of his pamphlet he
distinctly insinuates that I was afraid of hearing his reply, and had
it suppressed. For he says that the Editor of the paper in which my
articles appeared would not give him his opportunity, and that he so
refused “after various consultations with Mr. Belloc.”
As to the space which was offered, and the exceptional facilities
which, I understand, were granted to this angry man, the Editor must,
of course, speak for himself, and has, I believe, done so. But as to
the part which I took, it can be stated very simply. I was told by
the Editor (who had asked to see me on the matter) that Mr. Wells
desired to reply in the same columns in which he had been criticised.
I was asked what my attitude was in the matter, and I affirmed in the
strongest fashion (to which the Editor will bear witness) my belief
that the fullest right of reply should always be given to anyone
criticised on matters of fact or judgment. The interview did not last
ten minutes, but, to give a record of my attitude, I wrote a strong and
clear letter to the same effect. So far as I am concerned I asked for
nothing better than a reply, and I believe the Editor offered it.
Of two things, one, either Mr. Wells knew my attitude, in which case
his insinuation is inexcusable, or he did not, in which case it was
only rash; but at any rate he is, in this first grievance of his, quite
wrong. I particularly wanted him to have every opportunity for reply.
Nothing could suit me better.
Next he complains that I have not given him sufficient praise, or, at
any rate, not praised him as continuously, highly and enthusiastically
as I ought to have done. He complains that I only give him “slow” and
“formal compliments” (page 2) and “patronising praise” (page 5).
He is wounded because I accuse him of violent antagonism to the
Catholic Church (page 1) (an accusation which he denies very earnestly).
He indignantly repudiates any bias against the gentry in history--which
social class I ask him to revere.
Lastly, he accuses me of using such terms about many passages in the
History as “ignorant,” “childish,” “confused.”
I am afraid it is necessary before touching on these grievances to
explain to Mr. Wells what criticism is, for it is clear that he has
never considered the nature of that literary function.
When you criticise the writing of a man who deals with definite facts
and the conclusions to be drawn from them, it is your business to
praise what is praiseworthy in his effort, and to condemn what is
insufficient, false or bad.
You do not praise (if you are a serious critic) simply as a sort of sop
or counterbalance to blame; you praise because you find things worthy
of praise--and you blame where you find things worthy of blame.
There was nothing oily or patronising, nor even adventitious and
artificial in the praise which I saw fit to offer. It was not vague,
it was very definite, and, I think, just. Moreover, it was very strong
praise, of which any writer might be proud at the hands of a colleague.
I praised Mr. Wells’s lucidity and economy of manner, his sense of
proportion, and, above all, his most remarkable talent for presenting
a vivid picture to the reader. In this my words were, “None of our
contemporaries possesses it” (the gift of lucid and vivid description)
“in anything like the same degree.” In other words, I said that he
possessed a talent of the most important literary kind, which any
writer would envy, and that he possessed it in a degree which made him
superior to any contemporary.
I also said that he was conspicuously sincere, that he wrote very
clearly, with an “excellent economy in the use of words,” and was
unreserved in my hearty appreciation of his accuracy in details of
reference, such as dates, spelling of names, etc.
I went on to say how strongly he felt the importance of history to
mankind, though it is true that I qualified this by saying that by
mankind he meant the only sort of mankind he knew. I said of his
honesty of purpose, “that it was a quality apparent in every line of
the work.”
Really, if that sort of thing is “oiliness,” Mr. Wells must be
very difficult to please! It may be “slow”; it is not a torrent of
undiscriminating adulation; it is mixed with justified blame. But it is
such a catalogue of remarkable literary powers as I would not make for
another writer.
I did much more than this. I specifically praised whole portions of the
book as being quite excellent, notably his handling of the story of
language, and the précis on many sections of history. I have no space
here to give a list of the passages in which I compliment him; but
they are numerous, as any one of my readers will see when my book (_A
Companion to Mr. Wells’s “Outline”_) shall appear.
But he is not satisfied; and I am afraid the truth must be that these
recent large, popular circulations of his have gone to his head, and
now make him think himself much more talented than he is.
Next he has a grievance which I have no doubt is quite sincere in his
own mind, but which any impartial observer, I think, would smile at. I
have said that he acts with violent antagonism to the Catholic Church,
and I have called that his motive. That it is his motive Mr. Wells
“earnestly denies.”
Well, the whole book is written quite clearly round the object of
convincing the reader, by so-called evidence, rather than reasoned
argument, that there is no design in nature, and therefore no
all-powerful creative God as the Author of nature; therefore, again, no
revelation of such a God to men, therefore, naturally, no question of
the Incarnation in Jesus Christ. The Atonement is man-made nonsense:
The Fall of Man never happened, the Resurrection is a foolish story,
and the Eucharist a make-believe.
Now what Body is it which maintains in their entirety the doctrines
thus attacked? Can anyone deny that it is the Catholic Church? Many of
them have been held by other Bodies schismatical or heretical to it,
and therefore the doctrines are often alluded to as those not of the
Catholic Church, but of a vague entity, impossible to define, called
“Christianity.” Nevertheless, we all know that the denial to-day of
those doctrines does not provoke determined resistance in any large
organised Body outside the Catholic Church.
Apart from this, there are expressions of contempt which quite clearly
show the rabidness of the author’s reaction against the Creed. There
is no doubt at all that the Church makes him “see red”--as she does so
many others.
He says he is not conscious of any such motive in attacking all the
prime dogmas of the Christian Faith.
Well, I will give him a parallel. Suppose a foreigner were to write
an Outline of Nineteenth Century History, and to say in it that
Islanders were always rascals, that the love of sport and games was
degrading--and particularly vicious that of football and cricket--that
the English language was an offensive vehicle of thought and had
produced nothing worthy; that sea-power was a myth, and that Nelson in
particular was a bungler at handling ships; that the administration
of India was a failure and a crime; and that the creation of large
Overseas Colonies from the Mother Country was a fatuous experiment.
Should we not say that the gentleman had some bias against England?
Were he to tell us that he was not conscious of such a motive, we
should answer, “Very well, then, you aren’t--since you say so. But the
motive is certainly there, and your case is the most extraordinary case
of the subconscious ever presented to a bewildered onlooker.”
Next, Mr. Wells objects most emphatically that I have done him the
grievous wrong of calling him a patriot.
I am quite willing to withdraw the words, to admit my blunder, and to
apologise to Mr. Wells for having made it. Every man is the judge of
his own thoughts, and if he assures me that he hates his country, or is
even indifferent to its fate, I will readily accept the statement. I
will substitute in my book for the word “patriot” the word “national,”
my only point being that Mr. Wells is highly local in his outlook. I
was careful to say that the patriotic (or national) motive was, in my
opinion, an advantage to the historian; but that its great danger was
limitation, and that in the particular case of Mr. Wells the limitation
was so narrow as to be disastrous to a general view of Europe: making
him unable to understand anything that was not of his own particular
suburban world.
He is wounded because I pointed out his odd reaction against the idea
of a gentleman, and his dislike of the gentry, and says that I bid him
“revere” them. I never asked him to do anything so silly as to revere
the gentry. I am sure I do not revere them myself. What I did say was
that it weakened an historian and pretty well put him out of court when
he wrote, not with balanced judgment, but negatively, out of hatred;
and that piece of criticism I must maintain.
As for his attitude towards the type called “a gentleman” in history,
and in contemporary life, it would be easy to give examples out of
other books from the same pen. But I am rigidly confining myself to
_this_ book--the _Outline of History_--and I submit that right through
this work you see this strong dislike appearing. It appears in his
treatment of the type, Roman, French or English, ancient, mediæval
or modern. To take one instance out of a hundred, his sneer at the
late Lord Salisbury in the pamphlet against me is characteristic. He
suggests that this great man and considerable scientist was incompetent
to discuss a simple question in biology, and had to be coached for the
purpose, and badly coached. All our generation is a witness to the
great talent of Lord Salisbury and to the range of his learning, and
since he was no man’s enemy, and certainly never can have done any
harm, direct or indirect, to Mr. Wells, I can only suggest that the
word “Lord” was sufficient to throw Mr. Wells off his balance.
Now for the condemnatory words to which he objects,--presumably
on account of their force--words which I have, indeed, used in
connection with his work, and shall certainly use again: such words
as “ignorance,” “blunders,” “childish,” “unscientific,” etc. I see
I must again explain to Mr. Wells an obvious principle in criticism
which he fails to grasp. A word is not out of place in criticism unless
it is either irrelevant or false in statement or in degree. The mere
strength of a word does not put it out of court. On the contrary, if
the strength of the word is exactly consonant to the degree of error
noted the criticism is more just than if a milder word had been used.
To say that a man who poisons his mother in order to obtain her fortune
is “reprehensible” is bad criticism. To call him an “inhuman criminal”
is sound criticism.
_Irrelevant_ condemnatory words are very properly objected to by their
victims. But _relevant_ condemnatory words are not only admissible, but
just and even necessary.
I must not fill the whole of this little reply of mine with a mass of
quotation illustrating the justice of the words I have used, but I can
give a few examples which are conclusive, and which the reader has only
to hear to be convinced.
As to “ignorance.” This is a word exactly applicable to point after
point in the _Outline_ which I have thoroughly exposed. For instance,
it is ignorance not to appreciate the overwhelming effect of Latin
literature upon all our civilisation. It is not mere omission which
has left out this capital factor from Mr. Wells’s strange idea of Rome;
it is, and could only be, an insufficient knowledge of what that factor
was. If a schoolboy, writing an outline of the Battle of Waterloo,
leave out all mention of Blücher, that is not a mere omission, it is
ignorance.
There is an example of ignorance on a very wide general point. Next let
me give an example of a highly particular point. It is really startling
in its effect.
Mr. Wells nourishes the idea that the technical name for the
Incarnation is the Immaculate Conception!
It is perfectly legitimate to say that the man of average education is
not bound to be familiar with technical terms in a special department,
such as that of religious terminology; but when he sets out to discuss
that particular department, he must at least have the alphabet of it.
Had he never mentioned the Immaculate Conception at all, the accusation
would not lie: as he has foolishly blundered into mentioning it, the
accusation does lie. A Frenchman who has never been to England cannot
be called ignorant because he is unfamiliar with the streets of London.
But what of a Frenchman who writes a guide to London and mixes up
Victoria Station with Buckingham Palace?
But by far the most striking example of ignorance in his work, an
example upon so astonishing a scale that one could hardly believe it
even of popular “scientific” stuff, is to be found in Mr. Wells’s
complete ignorance of the modern destructive criticism of Darwinian
Natural Selection. He not only (as we shall see in a moment) has never
heard of this European, English and American work--he actually denies
its existence and imagines I have made it up!
Again, I have used the word “childish” of his attitude on more than one
occasion.
Is the word “childish” too strong? I will give examples. In his fury
against me he suggests that I cannot “count beyond zero,” and he
admits, with a sneer, that I perhaps understand the meaning of the word
“strata.”
He tries to make capital of my giving the name of the very eminent
anthropologist, E. Boule, without putting “Monsieur” before it, and
says that I “elevate Monsieur Boule to the eminence of ‘Boule.’” That
is childish. All the world cites eminent men by their unsupported
name. It is a sign of honour. For instance, that great authority, Sir
Arthur Keith (whom Mr. Wells sets up to have read and _followed_), says
“Boule.” Didn’t Mr. Wells know that?
He says that he uses the term “Roman” Catholic because it is the
only one he knows with which to distinguish between the many kinds
of Catholics. Whereas (and everybody knows it, including Mr. Wells
in his more sober moments) the term is only used either because it
is the legal and traditional word of English Protestantism, or, much
more legitimately, to distinguish between us of the world-wide Roman
Communion and those sincere men (many of whom I am proud to count my
friends) who emphasise Catholic doctrine in the English Church and
call themselves “Anglo-Catholics.” This wild protest, that there are
any number of other Catholics--Scotto-Catholics, Americano-Catholics,
Morisco-Catholics, Indo-Catholics, Mongolo-Catholics--is frankly
ridiculous, and ridiculous after a fashion which it is legitimate to
call “childish”: the mere explosion of a man in a passion.
Yet another example. Finding me to have overlooked a tiny misprint
(“ai” for “ia”) in the printing of a proper name, he writes a whole
page about it.
The proper adjective for absurdities of that kind is the adjective
“childish.” I could give any number of other examples, but I think
these are quite enough.
In point of fact, I only use the word “childish” rarely--I do not
know how often in my whole book, but at a guess I should say not more
than three times. But each time I am sure that it is well deserved.
However, if he prefer a more dignified adjective, such as “immature” or
“unstable” or “puerile,” or any other, I am quite willing to meet him,
so long as he allows me to say that he only too often in his violence
does write things which make him ridiculous from their lack of poise.
And what of the adjective “confused” or (for I am afraid I allowed
myself that licence) “muddle-headed”? Well, I can give examples of
that innumerable. For instance, he cannot conceive that I should call
him unscientific, seeing that he was one of Huxley’s students. What
on earth has that got to do with my accusation? If a man should call
me a very poor Latin scholar (which I am--but then I do not write
popular manuals on Latin poetry), would it be any reply to tell him
that I had been as a boy at a school of which Cardinal Newman was the
head, or as a young man that I had been at Balliol; or that among my
intimate acquaintances whom I listen to fascinated upon classical
themes were some of the greatest scholars of my time? Whether Mr. Wells
is a scientific man or not must be decided, not by his having attended
classes under Huxley, but by the use he has made of his reading; and it
is easy to prove that that use has been deplorable.
Mr. Wells is unscientific because he does not survey the whole of
evidence upon a point, and weigh it, and especially because he is
perpetually putting forward hypothesis as fact--which may be called the
very criterion of an unscientific temper; because he introduces mere
fiction as an illustration of supposed fact (e.g. the nonsense about
human sacrifice at Stonehenge) and the material for a magazine shocker
as though it were history.
It is quite unscientific to tell people that a point highly debated and
not yet concluded ranks as ascertained scientific fact.
It is quite unscientific, in talking of early Christian doctrine,
to leave out tradition; still more is it unscientific to work on it
without any knowledge of the sub-Apostolic period. It is unscientific
in the highest degree to leave out an elementary mathematical argument
as though it were mere juggling with figures, and to play to the
gallery by saying that your critic has got some wonderful system of
figures or other which nobody can follow.
The words “science” and “scientific” do not imply a smattering of
biology or geology; still less do they imply mere popular materialism.
They imply real knowledge, finally accepted after full enquiry upon
complete evidence; and that is why there is nothing less scientific in
the world than this so-called popular “science,” which is perpetually
putting forward exploded guesses of the last century as ascertained
facts.
As for muddle-headedness, what can be more muddle-headed than mixing up
the general theory of evolution with the particular (and now moribund)
materialist theory of Natural Selection? And yet that is what Mr. Wells
is perpetually doing!
It is true that a great many other people do it too, but that is no
excuse. The whole of his argument on pages 18, 19 and 20 is precisely
of that kind. It would be incredible to me that any man could get
confused between two such completely separate ideas had I not most
wearisome and repeated experience of it--and here is Mr. Wells
repeating it again!
The general theory of transformism (which itself is now subjected to a
very heavy and increasing modern attack) may be compared to saying that
a man travelled from London to Birmingham. But the theory of Natural
Selection may be compared to saying that he travelled by motor-car and
not by railway.
Now suppose a man on trial for his life for a murder which had taken
place not on the railway, but by the roadside between the two towns.
The whole issue turns upon whether the prisoner had travelled by
motor-car or by railway. What should we say of Counsel for the Defence
who confused these two issues and thought that the prosecution was
concerned merely with the man’s going from one town to the other, and
not with the road he travelled? I do not know whether the judge would
stop him or no, but I know that Counsel for the Crown would walk round
him. He would say, “The issue is not whether the man went from London
to Birmingham; we grant that. The point is whether he went by motor-car
or by railway.” The only issue in the controversy, which Mr. Wells has
both misunderstood and rashly engaged in, is upon the _agency_ of
Evolution, not upon Evolution itself. Yet he has confused the two!
Another example of bad muddle-headedness is his mixing up the
Catholic use of relics and the Catholic use of sacred images with the
unwarranted illustration of the unknown prehistoric past, and the
unwarranted basing of a detailed conclusion upon the insufficient
evidence of a few bones.
I say in my criticism of Mr. Wells, and I say quite rightly, that to
put forward a picture of an imaginary being called “Eoanthropus,”
giving him a particular weapon and gait and gesture, and an expression
(which, as I have said, made him very like one of my acquaintance),
was utterly unwarranted upon the exceedingly doubtful evidence of
the fragments called “The Piltdown skull.” Sacred images in Catholic
use are not--and surely everybody ought to know that--attempts at
reconstruction, still less are they fakes to try and get people to
believe that, for instance, an Archangel has goose wings and curly
hair. They are symbols; are powerful and useful aids to devotion, not
reconstructions.
Nor are relics in any way parallel to fossil evidences. We venerate a
relic of St. Agnes (such as I am glad to say I have in my house), both
because it is a striking memorial of that very holy witness to the
Faith, who gave up her life for it, and because (what I will not debate
here) we believe that the sanctity of the person can upon occasion give
virtue and power to such things. But we do not say, “In case you do
not believe St. Agnes ever existed, here is a fragment of her bone.”
To mix up two things so entirely different is muddle-headedness turned
glorious.
I could add not only further examples justifying the terms I have used,
but a great many other terms equally justified. I must leave it to the
ampler space of my book, _The Companion_ to his work, which Mr. Wells
will have the pleasure of seeing before him in a very few weeks.
II
MR. WELLS AS BIOLOGIST
I come now to what is the pith of Mr. Wells’s whole pamphlet. It is
evidently the matter upon which he is most pained; it is also the
matter on which he has most woefully exposed his lack of modern reading.
Through page after page--thirteen whole pages--he slangs and bangs
away at me--because I have exposed his ignorance of modern work upon
Darwinism.
There are in this furious attack two quite distinct points: first, his
accusation that I pose as being a man having special learning, with
European reputation in such affairs (very silly nonsense!); secondly,
his treatment of the arguments which I have put before my readers
against the old and exploded theory of Darwinian Natural Selection,
upon which theory, remember, all these popular materialists still
desperately rely in their denial of a Creative God and of Design in the
universe.
As to the first point: there can be no question of my having put on
airs of special knowledge in any of these affairs. Not only have I
not pretended to any special knowledge on geology or pre-history, or
biology: I have not even pretended to special knowledge on matters
where I have a good deal of reading in modern and mediæval history.
When I took up the atheist challenge presented by Mr. Wells’s book,
I did so as a man of quite ordinary education, because it was amply
evident on a first summary reading of it that the writer was not a
man of even average education. I pretend to no more than that working
acquaintance with contemporary thought which is common to thousands
of my kind, and I think it the more shame to Mr. Wells that with no
expert training I can make hay of his pretensions. Any man of average
education, reading and travel could have done the same.
Suppose somebody were to write a little popular manual on chemistry
with the object of showing that there is no God, and were to say of the
Atom that it had existed from all eternity, because it had no lesser
parts, but was eternally simple and indivisible. The man of ordinary
education would at once reply: “Have you never heard of the Electron?”
He would be justified in putting it much more strongly, and in saying,
“Is it conceivable that you are so hopelessly out of date that you have
never heard of the Electron and of the modern theory of the Atom?”
This does not mean that the person asking this most legitimate and
astonished question would be posing as an expert in chemistry; it would
simply mean that in ordinary conversation with his fellows he was
abreast of his time. Any of us whatsoever, even if he read no more than
newspaper articles, would have a right to say, “My good fellow, you are
out of court with your absurd old-fashioned simple Atom.”
Now suppose the person whom he had thus most justly criticised were to
lose his temper and say, “You are making up all this about electrons
out of your own head! You do not quote a single modern authority by
name in favour of this new-fangled theory of yours about electrons! The
reason you do not quote any name or authority is that you can’t! There
are no such names!” Would he not have delivered himself into the hands
of his opponent?
That is precisely what Mr. Wells has done. He has shown himself utterly
ignorant of all modern work in his own department, and he must not cry
out too loud at the consequences of his rashness.
Why on earth Mr. Wells challenged me to give names opposed to the old
Darwinian position I cannot conceive. It was a tactical blunder, so
enormous that I can make nothing of it, save on the supposition that
he, being a sincere man, does honestly believe no modern destructive
criticism of Natural Selection--let alone of Transformism--to be in
existence.
So much for my pose of great learning. I pose to about as much learning
in the matter as anyone among thousands of my own sort who by current
reading keep abreast of the mere elements of modern thought.
Now let us turn to the main point.
So there has been no destructive criticism of the old Darwinian
hypothesis? So there are no names to be quoted against the particular
distinctively Darwinian invention of Natural Selection? Indeed!
Let us see.
There is a certain Professor Bateson, who has left on record the
following judgment:--
“We” (biologists in general) “have come to the conviction that the
principle of Natural Selection cannot have been the chief factor in
determining species....”
And who is this Professor Bateson, Mr. Wells will ask (perhaps with
some contempt)?
Well, he was the President of the British Association when it met in
Melbourne in 1914, and the sentence I have just quoted dates from that
year.
Now let us turn to something totally different. I give it, not in
German, which I cannot read, but in what I believe to be an adequate
translation:--
“Natural Selection never explains at all the specifications of the
animal and vegetable forms that are actually found....”
And who is the unknown fellow I have got hold of here? Driesch: and
his conclusion is much older than that which we have from Professor
Bateson. Here, again, from the same insignificant little fellow, we
have this--thirty whole years ago:--
“For men of clear intellect Darwinism has long been dead....”
“Oh!” I can hear Mr. Wells saying, “but who is this Driesch?” Well, he
stands among the greatest of the German biologists to all educated
men. But Mr. Wells has never heard of him.
There is yet another German who put it more strongly still, for he
actually gave a title to his book which is, being interpreted, _The
Death-bed of Darwinism_. And who was he? He was only a person called
Dennert.
Here Mr. Wells will, I am sure, protest and say, “Oh, this Dennert you
tell me about is surely extreme.” I am rather inclined to agree. But
that is not the point. He wanted modern authorities, and I am giving
him a few. Mr. Wells had never heard of Dennert.
Let us turn to Dwight:--
“We have now the remarkable spectacle that just when many
scientific men are all agreed that there is _no part_ (my italics)
of the Darwinian system that is of any great influence, and that
as a whole the theory is not only unproved, but impossible, the
ignorant, half-educated masses have acquired the idea that it is to
be accepted as a fundamental fact....”
Who is this fellow Dwight? cries Mr. Wells. Whoever heard of him? I do
not know whether Mr. Wells has ever heard of him, but he wrote in the
year 1918. And he happened to hold the position of Professor of Anatomy
at Harvard University.
At it again! In the year 1919 there was published by a certain
Professor Morgan (who, very rightly, is a great admirer of Darwin as
the founder of popular modern interest in evolution):--
“Selection does _not_ (my italics) bring about transgressive
variation in a general population.”
Indeed, Professor Morgan’s whole book, and one might say his whole
work, is a moderate but sufficient destruction of the old orthodox
Darwinian stuff. Mr. Wells is now becoming restive. “Who’s this chap
Morgan? I haven’t heard of him. He’s a nobody?” Well, I am no student.
I am only a general reader--but I should imagine that Professor Morgan
was somebody, for he is the Professor of Experimental Zoology in the
University of Columbia.
Shall I go on among these authorities whom Mr. Wells assures us don’t
exist? We have Le Dantec, with his whole crushing book of 1909. Le
Dantec is only a Frenchman, it is true, but, after all, he was at the
time the newly-appointed Professor of General Biology at the University
of Paris giving his lectures at the Sorbonne.
I might go right back to Nägeli, of whom certainly Mr. Wells has heard,
for his work dates from some years before 1893--the date when Mr. Wells
seems to have stopped making notes in class. But perhaps Mr. Wells
would like the actual words of that authority--which again I quote
(from a translation, because I cannot read German):--
“Animals and plants would have developed much as they did even had
no struggle for existence taken place....”
Would Mr. Wells like to hear Korchinsky? It will be news for him:--
“Selection is in no way favourable to the origin of new forms.”
And again, from the same authority:--
“The struggle for existence, and the selection that goes with it,
restricts the appearance of new forms, and is in no way favourable
to the production of these forms. It is an inimical factor in
evolution.”
Korchinsky may sound in Mr. Wells’s ears an outlandish name, but I do
assure him the authority is not to be denied.
Or would he like Cope, as long ago as 1894? He at least, I believe (I
am only quoting from the books of others), was pretty definite upon the
impossibility of the rudimentary forms having survival values. Or,
shall we have Delage--yet another Continental name, and a Professor in
these subjects?--
“On the question of knowing whether Natural Selection can engender
new specific forms, it seems clear to-day that it cannot.”
That is straightforward; that is not of yesterday; that is as old as
1903.
Do let me fire one more shot at Mr. Wells--it is such fun!
I take hotch-potch from a page printed a whole nineteen years ago, this
further set of names out of a much larger number there given:--
“Von Baer, Hartmann, Packard, Jeckel, Haberlandt, Goette, von
Sachs, Kassowitz, Eimer.”
I quote not my own list (for I am quite incompetent here), but the
words of a first-class authority who draws up this list, including many
other names, and ends:--
“Perhaps these names mean little to the general reader” (Mr.
Wells being here the general reader). “Let me translate them
into the Professors of Zoology, of Botany, of Paleontology, and
of Pathology, in the Universities of Berlin, Paris, Vienna,
Strasbourg, Tubingen, Amsterdam, etc. etc.”
“And who writes thus?” Asks Mr. Wells (getting a little nervous)--why,
only one of the principal and most serious critics in Biology of
nineteen years ago, and with a chair in Stanford University.
I should have no difficulty in adding to the list. I have quoted here
more or less haphazard and hastily from my very general and superficial
reading. But surely when a man tells you that you have no authorities
behind you, and that you are making things up out of your own head,
even such a list as this must sound pretty startling to him. Mr. Wells
had no idea of its existence. If he had he would not have questioned it.
I have no quarrel with ignorance of this kind, as such. There is no
particular reason why any general writer, myself or Mr. Wells, or
Jones or Brown or Robinson, should have even this amount of knowledge
on a special department of modern science. But then, if he hasn’t, he
shouldn’t write about it; still less should he say that the authorities
alluded to don’t exist--that their names cannot be quoted, because
there are none, and that the arguments advanced by me were made up by
an ignorant man who had no expert work from which to quote.
Now that last sentence leads me to yet another thrust of the battering
ram which I am bringing against poor Mr. Wells. He says that the
arguments I have advanced against Natural Selection are of my own
imagining.
So the arguments I have put forward (only a few main arguments out
of many) were made up out of my own head, and have no support from
authority? I have no acquaintance with the names or general conclusions
of any experts in these affairs? It would be, indeed, astonishing if I
had acted thus, seeing that nothing was easier than for me to write to
any friend engaged in biological study and get the amplest information.
I did not do so, because there was no necessity to do so. That liberal
education--which Mr. Wells derides--was sufficient.
Really, Mr. Wells here flatters me too much! He does not know that the
arguments were not mine but the main arguments which have been set
forward by a host of competent authorities, and which have proved so
damaging that even the remaining defenders of Darwinism have had to
modify their position.
Thus my first argument is the well-known one of accident being quite
unable to explain the co-ordination of variations necessary to
adaptation.
The point is this, that not only one accidental advantageous variation
which might give an animal a better chance of survival has to be
considered, but the general adaptation of _all_ the organism to new
conditions; not only that, but the marvellous adaptation of thousands
upon thousands of special relations within complex organisms such as
are the higher animals. Left to chance, such co-ordination would be
impossible. The chance of a vast number of favourable variations all
arriving together _by accident_ approximates to zero. It is a mere
matter of arithmetic.
That argument in Mr. Wells’s judgment is “burlesque,” “beautifully
absurd,” and so forth. But the judgment is not passed on him by me (who
make no pretence to anything but the most general reading on these
affairs). It is passed by such an authority, for instance, as Wolff. It
is clear that Mr. Wells has never heard of Wolff; yet it is, I believe,
now nearly eighteen years since Wolff brought out this argument,
and for all I know many another clear-headed man had preceded him;
certainly a great many have followed.
I do not pretend to have read Wolff; I have not. But I have read the
significant quotations from him, and even if I had not done so I
should, as a man of general education, have known at least what his
position was. Shall I quote a single (translated) sentence? (Mr. Wells
with his wide command of languages may look it up in the original,
called, I believe, _Beitrage zur Kritik der Darwinischen Lehre_):--
“One could possibly imagine a gradual development of the adaptation
between one muscle-cell and one nerve-ending, through selection
among an infinity of chance-made variations; but that such shall
take place coincidently in time and character in hundreds or
thousands of cases in one organism is inconceivable.”
My second argument is equally a commonplace with educated men, and in
saying that I am the author of it Mr. Wells is again flattering me a
great deal too much, and again betraying his own astonishing lack of
acquaintance with the subject he professes to teach.
I pointed out, as hundreds have pointed out before me, that Darwinism
obviously breaks down from the fact that it demands each step in
evolution to be an advance in survival value over the last. There again
it is a plain matter of arithmetic that the chance of this happening
accidentally is impossible. Mr. Wells is so confused in mind that he
quotes as a bad example what I said about the reptile and the bird.
He seems to think that the argument is upset by the fact that there
are intermediate forms and that in these intermediate forms the fore
legs lose their function before they become wings. If one could prove
such a transformation--which one cannot, it is mere hypothesis--it
would have nothing to do with Natural Selection; it would be simply an
example of transformism. What I say (and what is obviously true in a
myriad instances) is that between the foot of the land animal and the
flapper of the whale, between the powerfully defensive and aggressive
great ape and the weak, more intelligent man, there must be stages (if
the transition ever took place) where the organism was at a positive
disadvantage, and that consideration blows Darwinian Natural Selection
to pieces.
When Korchinsky calls selection through the struggle for existence a
factor inimical to evolution, he is saying exactly that; and, I repeat,
hosts of men great and small, of high authority like these Professors
or of no authority like myself, have been repeating that obvious bit of
common sense for something like a lifetime, though it would seem that
for some extraordinary reason Mr. Wells has never heard of it.
He makes the same sort of mistake about my third argument, which
was that rare variations would, under the action of pure chance,
necessarily be soon reabsorbed in the mass, and disappear. He thinks I
invented this argument in 1926.
Great Heavens! It is perhaps the most widely known of all Nägeli’s
famous seven objections to Natural Selection which were formulated
before Mr. Wells left off reading on these subjects. He ought to have
been acquainted with them even in the elementary class work of his
youth, however little he might later read of more modern work.
Has Mr. Wells never heard that this was the very argument which
compelled the first serious modification of the Darwinian theory,
and began its breakdown? I suppose not--Any more than he has heard
that what he foolishly calls “_my_” first argument seriously
shook Weissmann’s position--that most formidable of the Darwinian
remnant--and that as long ago as 1896 Weissmann did, if I am not
mistaken, in the preface to his book virtually admit that it could not
be got over.
And so on. I could write a whole book upon that rather dreary and
negative subject, the abysmal lack of acquaintance Mr. Wells shows
with the thought of his time. I could expose him here in the matter of
Couenot, or of Vialleton’s book, as I exposed him in the _Manchester
Guardian_, or print in detail quotations from Carazzi, which I leave
for another occasion.
But I think I have said enough to expose Mr. Wells’s pretence of
reading in modern biology.
The bubble is pricked and has burst.
III
MR. WELLS’S IGNORANCE OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH