Mr. T. H. Huxley on the Method of Palceontology. 51 



lecture which can be justly so interpreted. I merely endeavoured 

 to prove, and I can find nothing in Dr. Falconer^s essay to 

 show that I did not prove,, first, that the j^hysinlogical laws of 

 correlation which Cuvier laid down are not as universally and 

 necessarily applicable as he seems to have imagined ; secondly, 

 that his physiological laws of correlation are of wholly subordi- 

 nate importance in palaeontology, if not absolutely unimportant, 

 the really important laws by which he worked being those mor- 

 phological laws, those empirical laws of coexistence which, as I 

 have said, no man lays down more clearly, but to which he 

 nevertheless ascribes in words, though not in practice, a subor- 

 dinate place. This entire misunderstanding of the real point 

 under discussion vitiates the whole of Dr. Falconer's paper. It 

 is again repeated at p. 481, just after Dr. Falconer has gravely 

 warned us how necessary are '' precision of thought and expres- 

 sion in disquisitions of this kind.'^ 



So again, at p. 487, Dr. Falconer says : — 



" The argument drawn by Mr. Huxley from instances of em- 

 pirical relation in the vegetable kingdom against there being 

 necessary or reciprocal relation in the high classes of the animal 

 kingdom is exactly of this character.'^ 



I assert that no one who carefully reads my abstract will find 

 the slightest ground for the assertion that 1 have ever made use 

 of any such argument as that imputed to me by Dr. Falconer. 

 What I say in regard to plants is : — 



"And if we turn to the botanist and inquire how he restores 

 fossil plants from their fragments, he will say at once that he 

 knows nothing of physiological necessities and correlations.'^ 



To any unprejudiced reader of ordinary intelligence it will be 

 quite obvious that the question of the existence of physiological 

 correlation between the parts of plants is here utterly untouched. 

 The question is whether the physiological or the morphological 

 laws of correlation guide the botanical palaeontologist. I affirm 

 the latter, and I am supported by every botanist with whom I . 

 have spoken on the subject. 



Dr. Falconer writes at p. 487 : — 



" Nature has formed living beings upon certain types which 

 constitute the basis of methodical nomenclature, and the corre- 

 lation of part to part and organ to organ is adjusted in subor- 

 dination to these types." 



Now what is this but an admission of all that I have contended, 

 for, namely, that the physiological correlation of organs is wholly 

 subordinate to their morphological or, in other words, typical 

 correlation ? What is it that Dr. Falconer attacks, after all ? 

 And this question becomes all the more bewildering, when we 

 find at p. 480 :— 



" Our first remark is, where and by whom has the principle of 



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