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THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



think he underestimates the potency of a 

 smaller number, for certainly, before a score 

 had made their appearance, " The Modern 

 Huxleys," whose skins are so ruthlessly 

 stripped off, would call upon their eternal 

 protoplasmic firmament to fall upon them 

 and hide them forever from the calamities 

 to come. 



The author of the performance before us 

 is of a most conservative temper, and re- 

 frains from altering even by a hair's-breadth 

 any of the questions he has undertaken to 

 discuss. All the conflicts, confusions, and 

 obscurities of the subject, are faithfully re- 

 flected in his pages. For the alleged strip- 

 ping off of disguises and plucking out the 

 core of things, we have sought in vain, our 

 impression being that this is exactly what 

 the author has avoided. The assiduity with 

 which he leaves things as he finds them is 

 remarkable, and this trait gives a special 

 value to his treatment of the subject. What 

 is denounced by many people, Mr. Leifchild 

 denounces, and what is indorsed by many 

 other people, Mr. Leifchild indorses, and, if 

 it happen to be the same thing, that is none 

 of his business. Mr. Lyell's views of spe- 

 cies are quoted, and then it is naively 

 stated that Mr. Lyell has abandoned them 

 with Mr. Lyell be all the responsibility. 

 His book may therefore be taken as hav- 

 ing some value in indicating the various 

 drifts of public opinion. Mr. Herbert 

 Spencer is freely denounced by certain 

 parties as the prince of materialists and 

 the arch-enemy of all religion, because he 

 is the leading exponent of the doctrine of 

 evolution, and Mr. Leifchild joins in the 

 condemnation, and quotes President Porter, 

 of Yale, exultingly as the great " Spencer- 

 crusher." But there are others who main- 

 tain that the doctrine of evolution is not 

 necessarily atheistic, or materialistic, or 

 destructive of religion, and with these also 

 Mr. Leifchild is in equal accord. Lest the 

 readers of Chancellor Crosby's introduction 

 should be puzzled at this statement, and 

 perhaps a little skeptical about it, we quote 

 the following passages from " The Great 

 Problem :" 



" The earnest and increased study of Na- 

 ture in our day leads us to much broader 

 views of Divine action than have been for- 

 merly entertained ; and to these views 



natural science conducts ns without really 

 leading us away from the -beity. Just as we 

 now discover more and more geographically, 

 so we discern more and more theologically. 

 The earth is far larger to us than to Herodo- 

 tus ; Columbus was a far better geographer 

 than the Grecian ; but the discovery of 

 America did not annul the existence of Eng- 

 land or Spain. The discovery of new stars 

 does not extinguish the old stars, does not 

 darken one beam of their light. In like 

 manner, the discovery of Natural and Sexual 

 Selection, or rather the application of them, 

 does not limit the action of the Creator" 

 (p. 256). " The unity of Evolution, as com- 

 prehended by the Cosmos, is aptly described 

 by Mr. Spencer, who shows the higher gen- 

 eralization of our knowledge concerning 

 Evolution to be so far as we know the con- 

 stitution of the world one unceasing and 

 all-perfecting system, advancing everywhere 

 and in all. After elaborately working out 

 his own theory, Mr. Spencer suggestively 

 intimates that the laws of Evolution, con- 

 templated as holding true of each order of 

 existence separately, hold true when we con- 

 template the several orders of existences as 

 forming together one natural whole. While 

 we think of Evolution as divided into Astro- 

 nomic, Biologic, Psychologic, Sociolcgic, 

 etc., it may seem to a certain extent a coin- 

 cidence that the same law of metamorphosis 

 holds throughout all its divisions. But 

 when we recognize these divisions as mere 

 conventional groupings made to facilitate 

 the arrangement and acquisition of knowl- 

 edge when we regard the different exist- 

 ences with which they deal as component 

 parts of one Cosmos we see at once that 

 there are not several kinds of Evolution hav- 

 ing certain traits in common, but one Evolu- 

 tion going on everywhere after the same 

 manner. While any whole is evolving, there 

 is always going on an Evolution of the parts 

 into which it divides itself. This holds truo 

 of the totality of things as made up of parts 

 within parts, from the greatest down to the 

 smallest. We know that, while a physically 

 cohering aggregate like the human body is 

 getting larger, and taking on its general 

 shape, each of its organs is doing the same ; 

 that, while each organ is growing and becom- 

 ing unlike others, there is going on a differ- 

 entiation and integration of its component 

 tissues and vessels ; and that even the com- 

 ponents of these components are severally 

 increasing and passing into more definitely 

 heterogeneous structures. But we have not 

 duly remarked that, setting out with the 

 human body as a minute part, and ascending 



