THE DOGMA OF EVOLUTION 



clue from the Malthusian principle of economics 

 which then had its greatest vogue and from Spencer's 

 dictum of the survival of the fittest. After his theory 

 is settled upon, in advance of any real experimental 

 proof, he determines to verify it by collecting facts 

 of every sort which might bear on variation. He de- 

 votes twenty-two years to this work and finally pub- 

 lishes a sketch of his theory not because he felt that it 

 was proved, but because Wallace had also arrived at 

 the identical theory. Certainly, if there ever were a 

 more perfect example of a deductive theory it would 

 be hard to find one.^ 



The time is past for discussing Lamarck's work as 

 merely an early and abortive attempt to formulate a 

 theory. The doctrine of the inheritance of acquired 

 traits must be considered as a theory equal in rank 



1 It should be clearly understood that I am not discussing what is 

 the most efficient scientific method, but whether Lamarck was a de- 

 ductive philosopher and Darwin, an exponent of inductive reason- 

 ing. Darwin certainly classed himself as following that method, 

 for he writes {Life and Letters, vol. I, p. 68) : "I worked on true 

 Baconian principles, and, without any theory, collected facts on a 

 wholesale scale. . . . Here, then, I had at last got a theory [i.e., at 

 the age of twenty-nine] by which to work ; but I was so anxious 

 to avoid prejudice that I determined not for some time to write 

 even the briefest sketch of it." This, as I have pointed out is the 

 reverse of the Baconian method. Karl Pearson, in discussing the 

 method of science {Grammar of Science, 3d edition, p. 30) says it is 

 imagination disciplined by severe criticism and quotes the above 

 passage as an illustration. Huxley is also clear on this point, as he 

 begins his essays on Darwiniana by discussing the hypothesis of 

 Mr. Darwin, and, in his essay on the Progress of Science, he makes 

 an elaborate attack on Bacon and the Baconian method and de- 

 fends Darwin's method by claiming that hypothesis and precon- 

 ceived ideas are necessary. However that may be, the Baconian 

 method does not proceed from hypothesis, and considering the 

 gradual minimising of the hypothesis of natural selection in Dar- 

 win's own mind and its present state, there is some question as to 

 the ultimate profit of working to support hypothesis. 



I 1683 



