1898] 213 



CORRESPOJ^DENOE 



MR COSTE ON DARWINISM AND DESIGN 



The problem of keeping up the proper intercomniunicatioii lietween the various branuhes 

 of human knowledge is one of such increasing intrinsic difficulty as the sciences grow 

 more specialised, that wc should be disposed to welcome rather than to disparage any 

 effort in this direction. For nothing (except the work itself) contributes more essentially 

 to the soundness of work in each science than that it should keep in touch with the 

 rest, and from time to time stop to contemplate its work from the standpoint of another 

 science. Yet any attempt to determine the general value for knowledge of a special 

 branch of research is apt to be regarded by the specialist as an intrusion upon his 

 domain rather than as a demonstration of intra-scientific amity. This is a pity, but I 

 nuglit have anticipated that my attempt to throw some light on the logical status of the 

 Darwinian Theory, in an article on " Darwinism and Design " published in the Con- 

 Icmporarij Rcvieiv for June 1897, would expose me to misrepresentation and hostility, 

 and I was prepared to bear a certain amount of this with philosophic composure. But 

 I cannot help thinking that Mr F. H. Perry Coste woidd have done better service to his 

 own cause if his criticism of my paper in the December number of Natxircd Science (vol. 

 xi., p. 408), had not been so largely composed of irrelevancies interspersed with the 

 refrain " Yah, metaphysician !" The more so, that this appeal to an obsolescent pre- 

 judice is as little a proof of Mr Coste's perspicacity as of his good temper. For even 

 if the whole tenor of my article did not show it to be intended as a piece of philosophical 

 criticism, he had my own Avord for it (I. c. p. 871) that I only claimed to be a philo- 

 sopher. 



I take the moi'e pleasure in drawing attention to a passage where Mr Coste has 

 read me aright because in so many other cases he gives me much ground to complain of 

 his ostentatious disregard of my stated purpose. 



Mr Coste criticises — or perhaps rather abuses — me severely for not doing a variety 

 of things which it lay beyond the scope of my article to deal with. I do not discuss, he 

 urges, (a) "the evolution of the solar system" (p. 409) ; (b) I do not jirove that varia- 

 tions are inherited or in fact definite (p. 411, 413) : (c) I ignore Weismannism (p. 414) ; 

 (d) I do not disprove all the mechanical alternatives to teleology (p. 413) ; and (e) I do 

 not prove a God (!) (p. 413). It is very terrible that all these things should have been 

 left undone in an article of eighteen pages ! But I may perhaps be permitted to point 

 out that I very distinctly disclaimed the intention of doing any one of these things, and 

 that it is scarcely candid on Jlr Coste's part to ignore these disclaimers. I rigidly 

 limited my.self to the subject indicated in my title, viz., Darwinism and Design, for the 

 very good reason that no one can profitably discuss everything at once. Moreover I had 

 it in mind to follow up my criticism of Darwinism by papers dealing with the other 

 evolution theories, although the pressure of other work has necessarily postponed the 

 execution of this jjroject. And even ilr Coste will hardly deny that a criticism of 

 modern biological conceptions must start with Darwinism, and not with the latest 

 lucubration of Prof. Weismann. Still, if it is any consolation to Mr Coste, I am quite 

 willing to state with respect to the several omissions laid to my charge, as to {a} that 

 I have yet to learn that Darwinism has any thing to say about ' ' the evolution of the 

 solar system" ; as to (/') that I regard this as a proper question for the biologist and 

 said so (I. c, p. 871, 879) ; as to (c) that it was not incumbent on me in dealing with 

 Darwinism to discuss Prof. Weismann's latest modification of a theory which, as Jlr 

 Romanes showed (in his " Examination of Weismannism "), has long ago been forced by 

 the pressure of the facts to give up the pretensions to logical consistency with which it at 

 first impressed even philosophers ; as to (d) and (e) that my purpose was only the 

 humbler one of showing that " properly understood Darwinism was not necessarily hostile 

 to teleology" {I. c, p. 882). Obviously the proof oi such contentions would require one 

 or more volumes. But I thought it valuable to clear the ground for such i)roof by show- 

 ing that Darwinism was not inconsistent with teleology. If I had gone on to show the 

 same thing in the case of the other theories of Evolution, and succeeded, I should then 

 have been in a position to make felt the positive argument for teleology. This argu- 

 ment is philosophic in character, and, in my opinion, irrefragable and sufficient to make 



