( xlvi ) 



The provisional idea thus formed has resulted in the remarks 

 that follow ; and it was an accident that caused the decision. In 

 the * Standard ' newspaper for the last day of the old yen,Y was 

 an anonymous sketch of the " Science of the Year." In 

 unsigned articles one is sometimes at a loss how to draw a dis- 

 tinction between what may be written to suit the requirements 

 of a particular journal, and what may reflect the writer's indi- 

 vidual opinion. In the case in point some remarks attracted my 

 attention, and the more so because on most subjects the writer 

 and myself seem in accord. 



The quotation is as follows: — "Naturalists of the new 

 school are showing less interest in collecting than their pre- 

 decessors. They half-despise the * species-maker,' and are all 

 for development, anatomy, and the philosophical bearings of the 

 study. So far this is well. It raises Zoology and Botany out of 

 the rut of mere museum work — preserving, labelling, cataloguing, 

 and classifying. But it is mischievous in so far that it makes 

 every acquisition simply subsidiary to Darwinism, without taking 

 into account the fact that without the knowledge of species by 

 which Darwin arrived at his first results any further advance is 

 dangerous. The botanist who philosophises on distribution, or 

 the zoologist on the connection between extinct and recent faunge, 

 is apt to blunder if he is not familiarly acquainted with modern 

 species, which may be theoretically mobile, but which for all 

 practical purposes are permanent. To compare fossil forms 

 without knowing living ones is simply courting error. Yet, for 

 the moment, this is the peril which the younger school are 

 encountering in their haste to grow rich in sweeping conclusions. 

 In this country biological science is in a state of transition. The 

 old style is passing away ; the new has not yet fully developed 

 itself." 



To me it appears that there is a singular amount of truth 

 in several suggestions in this short quotation, and that, taken as 

 a whole, no moderate man could possibly feel offended at the 

 general tenor of the remarks. The remark as to the existing 

 tendency to make every new discovery in natural science " sub- 

 sidiary to Darwinism " struck me as apropos. I yield to no one 

 in respect for the memory of our great philosopher. I yield 

 to no one in warmth of adherence to the broad princii^les of 

 Evolution. I take it that the broad principles of Evolution are 



