DARWIN AND HIS REVIEWERS. 175 



law of inheritance may be expected to keep botli the 

 original and the variety mainly true as long as they 

 last, and none the less so because they have given rise 

 to occasional varieties. The tailless Manx cats, like the 

 curtailed fox in the fable, have not induced the nor- 

 mal breeds to dispense with their tails, nor have the 

 Dorkings (apparently known to Pliny) affected the per- 

 manence of the common sort of fowl. 



As to the objection that the lower forms of life 

 ought, on Darwin's theory, to have been long ago im- 

 proved out of existence, and replaced by higher forms, 

 the objectors forget what a vacuum that would leave 

 below, and what a vast field there is to which a simple 

 organization is best adapted, and where an advance 

 would be no improvement, but the contrary. To accu- 

 mulate the greatest amount of being upon a given space, 

 and to provide as much enjoyment of life as can be 

 under the conditions, is what Xature seems to aim at ; 

 and this is effected by diversification. 



Finally, we advise nobody to accept Darwin's or 

 any other derivative theory as true. The time has not 

 come for that, and perhaps never will. T^e also ad- 

 vise against a simular credulity on the other side, in a 

 blind faith that species — that the manifold sorts and 

 forms of existing animals and vegetables — "have no 

 secondary cause." The contrary is already not unlike- 

 ly, and we suppose will hereafter become more and 

 more probable. But we are confident that, if a de- 

 rivative hypothesis ever is established, it will be so on 

 a solid theistic ground. 



Meanwhile an inevitable and legitimate hypothesis 

 is on trial — an hypothesis thus far not untenable — a 



