FIELD STUDY IN ORNITHOLOGY. 485 



had suffered a sort of atrophy on that side of his uature, as the <lis 

 used pinions of the Kakapo have become powerless, — the spiritual, the 

 imaginative, the emotional, we may call it. 



The case of Darwin illustrates a law — a principle we may call it— 

 namelj', that the spiritual faculty lives or dies by exercise or the want 

 of it even as does the bodily. Yet the atrophy was unconscious. Far 

 was it from Darwin to ignore or depreciate studies not his own. He 

 has shown us this when he prefixed to the title-page of his great work 

 the following extract from Lord Chancellor Bacon: "To conclude, 

 therefore, let no man, out of a weak conceit of sobriety, or an ill-applied 

 moderation, think or maintain that a man can search too far, or be too 

 well studied in the book of God's word, or in the book of God's works, 

 divinity or philosophy, but rather let men endeavor an endless progress 

 or proficieuce in both.'' In true harmony this with the spirit of the 

 father of natural history, concluding with the words, "O Lord, how 

 manifold are Thy works, in wisdom hast Thou made them all, the earth 

 is full of Thy riches." 



