EDITOR'S TABLE. 



553 



tage in a sphere in which the difficulties 

 of analysis and the chances of error are 

 relatively greater. So long as we only 

 tlnnk of science in connection with the 

 so-called natural sciences, the true con- 

 ception of science will not reveal itself 

 to us, and education in general will re- 

 main unfructified by the scientific spirit. 

 But when we reach the point of accept- 

 ing the methods of physical science as 

 far as they go, and applying them, with 

 such modifications as the case may call 

 for, to all other branches of knowledge, 

 holding ever as our clew the idea of util- 

 ity broadly and liberally undei-stood, we 

 shall be fairly on the way to that revo- 

 lution, or rather transformation, of our 

 educational systems which the new age 

 demands. 



THE EOYAL SOCIETY AND THE 

 DARWINIAN THEORY. 



It will be remembered that Lord 

 Salisbury, in the address delivered by 

 him last autumn as President of the 

 British Association, laid stress on the 

 difficulties which he found in the way 

 of accepting the doctrine of evolution, 

 and quoted in support of his position 

 some observations made several years 

 ago by Lord Kelvin. Lord Kelvin 

 himself has now been delivering an 

 annual address as President of the 

 Royal Society, and part of his duty in 

 connection therewith was to announce 

 that the society had this year conferred 

 tiie "Darwin Medal" on Prof. Huxley 

 as a "token of the value put by the so- 

 ciety on the part of his [Prof. Huxley's] 

 scientific activity bearing more directly 

 on the biological ideas with which the 

 name of Charles Darwin will always 

 be associated." That the Royal Soci- 

 ety should have instituted a Darwin 

 medal speaks plainly enough as to the 

 hold which Darwin's theory of the 

 origin of species has obtained upon the 

 scientific world; and that the medal 

 should have been awarded to so earnest 

 and thoroughgoing a champion of that 

 theory as Prof. Huxley is a jjlain indi- 



cation that scientific opinion is not tak- 

 ing any backward steps in this matter. 

 In referring to the award Lord Kelvin 

 chose his words with evident care; but 

 no fault could be found, so far as either 

 Darwin or Huxley was concerned, with 

 the following neatly turned sentences: 

 "That advocacy [Prof. Huxley's] had 

 one striking mark : while it made, or 

 strove to make, clear how deep the 

 new view went down, and how far it 

 reached, it never shrank from striving 

 to make equally clear the limits beyond 

 which it could not go. In these latter 

 days there is fear lest the view, once 

 new but now familiar, may, through 

 being stretched further than it will bear, 

 seem to lose some of its real worth. 

 We may well be glad that the advocate 

 of The Origin of Species by Natural 

 Selection, who once bore down its 

 foes, is still among us, ready, if need 

 be, to save it from its friends." 



At a dinner which followed the meet- 

 ing at which these words were uttered, 

 Prof. Huxley having been called upon 

 to respond to the toast of "The Medal- 

 lists," took occasion to say that the 

 theory propounded by Darwin "has 

 never yet been shown to be inconsist- 

 ent with any positive observations. . . . 

 I am sincerely of the opinion," he 

 added, "that the views which were 

 propounded by Mr. Darwin thirty-four 

 years ago will be understood hereafter 

 to mark an epoch in the intellectual his- 

 tory of the human race. They will 

 modify the whole system of our thoughts 

 and opinions, and shape our most inti- 

 mate convictions." In the face of such 

 a declaration, delivered under the cir- 

 cumstances described, it would certainly 

 be well if the honest and worthy people 

 who are always flattering themselves 

 on the sti'ength, generally, of this or 

 that pulpit utterance, that natural se- 

 lection and the doctrine of evolution 

 are exploded theories, would make up 

 their minds that practical men of sci- 

 ence are the best judges as to what 

 theories are helpful, and so far deserv- 



