u 4 



THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



place where all the faculties of the in- 

 tellect may be brought into the full- 

 est exercise. From the most trivial 

 questions of the ordering of the house- 

 hold, up to the ever-impending contin- 

 gencies of life and death, there is occa- 

 sion for sleepless solicitude, unremit- 

 ting thought, and extensive knowledge. 

 There is room for the play of the aes- 

 thetic faculties and a cultivated taste ; 

 there is need of light from various 

 sciences ; there is demand for a cautious 

 logic ; there is required a direct knowl- 

 edge of things, as well as of book in- 

 formation, and also a training in prac- 

 tical household concerns. All these 

 are constant and pressing subjects in 

 which both father and mother should 

 be interested and instructed, upon 

 which the very destiny of the family 

 depends. And yet Prof. Cairnes tells 

 us that the present element of weak- 

 ness in the family is the want of suffi- 

 cient subjects of common interest! He 

 is mistaken ; there are subjects enough 

 of mutual concern, but the element of 

 weakness is that they are neglected. 

 He would elevate and strengthen the 

 family by having the women go into 

 politics ; we are quite clear that this is 

 not the way the family is to be ele- 

 vated and improved. Prof. Cairnes's 

 remedy is no remedy at all, and would 

 rather be a fatal hindrance. The gen- 

 eral effect would be to preoccupy the 

 female mind with public instead of 

 private and domestic interests ; and to 

 divert attention from those home ques- 

 tions which are in fact a thousand 

 times more important to the commu- 

 nity than the issues of partisan strife. 



THE EIGHTS OF ORIGINALITY. 



To fair-minded readers, apology will 

 be unnecessary for the very consider- 

 able space that we devote this month 

 to the relation of Herbert Spencer to 

 the doctrine of Evolution : the miscon- 

 ceptions that have prevailed, regarding 

 Mr. Spencer's relation to this great doc- 



trine, make such a statement as this in- 

 dispensable in the interest of justice. 

 Much of the misunderstanding and er- 

 roneous representation is undoubtedly 

 due to the general ignorance of a sub- 

 ject which has recently attained unex- 

 pected prominence, and has to be dis- 

 cussed by many who are not well in- 

 formed about it. For example, in an 

 able and liberal article on Prof. Tyn- 

 dall's late address, in Harper's Weekly, 

 Mr. Darwin is declared to be "the most 

 famous expounder of Evolution." This 

 is so far from being true, that Mr. Dar- 

 win has never even attempted any such 

 thing. He has devoted his life to special 

 and important researches, which bear 

 upon the principle of organic develop- 

 ment ; but his writings, though rich in 

 biological contributions to the question, 

 do not contain any thing like a full or 

 comprehensive exposition of the sub- 

 ject. "Whole tracts of the inquiry they 

 do not touch ; the general evidence of 

 the truth of Evolution they do not give ; 

 nor do they subject the problem to that 

 rigorous analysis into its ultimate ele- 

 ments and factors which scientific in- 

 vestigation requires. Mr. Darwin has 

 shown with great learning how the 

 principle of natural selection gives rise 

 to diversities of organic species ; but 

 natural selection is no more Evolution 

 than a fusee is a watch, or a throttle- 

 valve a steam-engine ; and Harper's 

 Weekly might as well send its readers 

 to a treatise on Arches to get a knowl- 

 edge of Architecture as to Mr. Darwin's 

 writings to get a knowledge of Evolu- 

 tion. Perhaps no living man is better 

 acquainted with what Mr. Darwin has 

 done than Prof. Huxley ; but, in a lect- 

 ure before the Eoyal Institution of 

 Great Britain, he said : " The only com- 

 plete and systematic statement of the 

 doctrine " (Evolution) " with which I 

 am acquainted, is that contained in Mr. 

 Herbert Spencer's ' System of Philoso- 

 phy,' a work which should be carefully 

 studied by all who desire to know 

 whither scientific thought is tending." 



