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THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



public would mutter is not much to tlie 

 point, but it would hardly be the word 

 "evolution." Prof. Pearson, however, 

 in an article already alluded to, fur- 

 nishes plausible reason, as other writers 

 before him have done, for holding that 

 "evolution" might be a very pertinent 

 word not to mutter, but to utter, in 

 connection with the very question his 

 lordship had in view, and certainly a 

 better word than " design." Lord 

 Salisbury says that, although it is not 

 easy to give a precise logical reason for 

 the feeling, still the feeling is irresisti- 

 ble, that there can not really be sixty- 

 five primordial bodies, but that the 

 facts as cognized by us to-day conceal 

 some much siiupler condition of things. 

 Wliy? If, when we are confronted 

 with the difficulties which beset the 

 origin of species, our duty is to fall back 

 upon the doctrine of design, wby should 

 we not equally fall back on that doc- 

 trine when confronted with a seemingly 

 ridiculous number of elements? It is 

 very difficult to see why dogma should 

 interfere to cut off one line of investi- 

 gation and not another. Is it because 

 Lord Salisbury is chiefly interested in 

 physical studies that he repudiates for 

 them the fetters he is only too willing 

 to impose on biology ? It would almost 

 8eem so; but if he is not impious in 

 wishing to free physics from all dog- 

 matic entanglements, neitiier is the bi- 

 ologist who desires and claims as much 

 for the study of his choice. 



It is too late to try to turn men aside 

 from the unfettered, unbiased pursuit 

 of natural knowledge. The method 

 that Lord Salisbury prescribes for the 

 students of organic Nature has been 

 abundantly tried in the past and been 

 found abuMiiantly unfruitful. The more 

 excellent way which Darwin has shown 

 has, according to Lord Salisbury's own 

 conftssion, already fertilized wide fields 

 of knowledge ; and its impulse and effi- 

 cacy are far as yet from being exhaust- 

 ed. Darwin never supposed that he 

 had furnished a key to all the mysteries 



of organic Nature, nor do the wiser of 

 his followers entertain any such notion 

 to-day. If some are foolish enough to 

 think so, they will become wiser in 

 time ; but better far is it to place undue 

 faith in a definite physical principle 

 than, aban(^ning the search for causes, 

 to adopt an arbitrary and stereotyped 

 explanation which raises a barrier to all 

 further intellectual advance. 



POPULIST LOGIC. 



A Missouri paper of the " Populist " 

 faith predicts that when the state as- 

 sumes control of the railways which 

 it says is but a question of time and a 

 very short time at that " the employees 

 will be well paid, and we will hear no 

 more of strikes and boycotts, while the 

 great mass of the people who patronize 

 the roads will for the first time know how 

 little it actually costs to transport per- 

 sons, products, and intelligence." As an 

 instance of how cheaply the Govern- 

 ment can do things, it cites the fact that 

 a newspaper publisher can send one 

 hundred pounds weight of his papers 

 all over the country by post, and have 

 them delivered, say, to twelve hundred 

 different persons, for one dollar a 

 charge, it goes on to say, which is found 

 " ample to meet all expenses." It is a 

 great pity that journals which profess 

 to deal with facts, and especially those 

 which, from a basis of supposed facts, 

 venture to draw most important and 

 sweeping conclusions, do not take a lit- 

 tle more trouble to state things correct- 

 ly. What evidence is there, we would 

 ask, that one cent per pound postage on 

 newspapers is a paying rate? It is not 

 to be found in the Postmaster General's 

 report, which shows for the year 1893 a 

 deficit of $5,177,17L This deficit arises 

 on the whole business of the Post Oflice, 

 which includes the carrying of letters at 

 the rate of about fifty cents a pound ; so 

 that, could this part of the business, 

 which undoubtedly yields a profit, be 

 separated from the carrying of inferior 



