92 



THE GARDENER'S MONTHLY 



[March, 



the world we should say that there were multi- 

 tudes who would not accept his definition of 

 either. 



It is however, not always easy to catch the 

 meaning of the author himself, for his fondness 

 for illustrations generally ends as they often do 

 with school boys, in obscuring the main points. 

 For instance, speaking of crime and criminals, 

 he observes " If a man has a barren tree in his 

 garden, which draws to itself the nutriment re- 

 quired for the proper growth of useful plants, 

 would he display the most wisdom in attempt- 

 ing to remedy the matter by trimming around 

 among the uppermost branches, or by grubbing 

 the thing up by the roots ?" And at once we be- 

 gin to wonder how the poor sinners among 

 human beings are to be " grubbed up." Whether 

 the cheapest way would be to hang them at 

 once, or whether imprisonment for life would 

 fairly come under the grubbing up idea? After 

 all, the best display of wisdom might be open to 

 some difference of opinion. A gardener once 

 ■did ask of the great master for leave to try a 

 little of his horticultural skill before the barren 

 fig tree was "grubbed" up, — and the master 

 thought he was wise. 



Refutation of Darwinism, by r. "Warren 

 O'Neill, Philadelphia; J. B. Lippincott & Co. 

 By direct ways man has been taught how every 

 thing began ; but there is no possible harm in 

 starting from the other end also, and by ques- 

 tioning nature herself, note the correspondence 

 of her answers with what has been revealed to 

 us. There ought to be, and in the end there 

 must be a coincidence between these two lines 

 of thought ; but while they are being pursued, 

 one has nothing whatever to do with the other. 

 In asking Nature how varieties, genera and 

 species began, we therefore set aside, for the 

 moment, all that we have been taught, and all 

 that we believe, and await patiently Nature's 

 answer. Here are plants and animals about us, 

 how came they here? Were they always, from 

 the first as they are now ? Or have they changed 

 and are changing still ? We see from the geo- 

 logical record, that there was a time when there 

 was neither plant nor animal on the earth, — that 

 at a later period only the lowest forms existed, 

 — and that only in the later ages have what we 

 may regard as the most complicated organisms 

 appeared. There is no question that there has 

 been a progression from the most simple, to 

 man, the most complicated of all. Then comes 

 the question, — have these changes been brought 



about by Divine laws, which are continuously ope- 

 rating for change ? — or by Divine power continu- 

 ously setting aside old laws and establishing new 

 ones? — by laws continually operating, or by 

 laws continually being broken ? For that there 

 has been a continuous succession of changes, no 

 one pretends to deny. 



When we ask a question, it is not in human 

 nature not to inquire what may be the reply. 

 Indeed it is because we suspect that we ask. 

 There could be no questioning without a prior 

 doubt of some kind. We see a man full grown, 

 and we see a babe ; and, knowing that there was 

 a time when man made a first appearance on the 

 earth, we ask did he come here as a babe, as he 

 does now, or did he appear first as a full-grown 

 man ? We know he does not now come into the 

 earth full grown, and we know a babe cannot take 

 care of itself. If this were all that be left to us, 

 it would be no use to consider the problem at 

 all ; but we see in the lower forms of life the 

 young are capable of an independent existence, 

 at once from birth, and thus we see that under 

 existing laws it is just possible that there might 

 be a development from the young capable, to 

 the young incapable. In other words, though man 

 or the higher animals may not have come into 

 existence in the first place, either full grown or 

 as babes, so far as we can judge from any exist- 

 ing laws, yet it is possible they may have been 

 developed from a lower to a higher plane by de- 

 grees. It is this possibility, this guess, which is 

 among the foundations of the modern questioning 

 of nature known as " Evolution." It did not arise 

 with Mr. Darwin ; but he has done more than 

 any other man to show that it may be a reason- 

 able guess. This, and nothing more, is " Dar- 

 winism," and this is what Mr. O'Neill has un- 

 dertaken to refute. 



Mr. O'Neill takes credit that he "refutes" Mr. 

 Darwin by Darwin's own facts, — but at the outset 

 this places Mr. O'Neill at a great disadvantage. 

 It would be much better for his side of the case 

 if he were to fall to work and collect facts as in- 

 dustriously as Mr. Darwin has done.. But there 

 is nothing in the work before us to show that he 

 is capable of any such an effort. He appears to 

 have been a diligent closet student, and nothing 

 more. He is master of the art of logic as taught 

 in the schools, knowing little of the logic of facts 

 as derived from experience. It soon becomes 

 evident that he mishapprehends Mr. Darwin, 

 and that though he quotes profusely from Mr. 

 Darwin's works, and makes ver}'^ good points as 



