the Northern Regions. 148 



in differing from the greatest original discoverer, and first philo- 

 sophical authority in his own favourite science, as well as from all 

 (he most eminent names in geological research, — a subject on 

 which his own information is evidently extremely limited ; and 

 yet one, without an intimate acquaintance with which, it is im- 

 possible to conduct, to a satisfactory conclusion, the discussions 

 upon which he has chosen to enter. 



I regret, then, that I feel obliged, by what appear to myself 

 the interests of scientific truth, to object to his estimate of the 

 value of the evidence derived from the animal kingdom, as to 

 the former temperature of the northern regions (published in 

 your last Number), as altogether insufficient and superficial. 



These characters appear to me to attach to his remarks, be- 

 cause he has allowed no due weight to that which, in fact, con- 

 stitutes by far the most important feature of that evidence, its 



cumulative character. In his introductory statement, he has in- 

 deed made a brief enumeration of the classes of organic remains 

 which involves it ; but he has altogether overiooked it in the ar- 

 gumentative part of his memoir. He may perhaps be himself 

 of opinion that his reasonings are so conclusive against every par- 

 ticular inference, that they are equally valid against the collec- 

 tive sum of all those inferences ; but I shall endeavour to shew 

 that the great proposition which his argument involves, namely, 

 that it is impossible to reason from generic affinities as to the 

 geographical distribution of particular species, is altogether un- 

 sound, being in direct contradiction to all that we know of the 

 actual laws of nature in this respect ; and these laws are ob- 

 viously the only basis on which philosophical reasoning can be 

 built. 



First, then, allow me to remind your readers of the cumula- 

 tive nature of the evidence on which the geologists opposed to 

 Dr Fleming rely. They do not, like himself, reason from a ^^v^ 

 detached cases, but from an induction of the whole phenomena 

 presented by the distribution of organic remains,— from a collec- 

 tive view of all the analogies. Each of these analogies, taken 

 separately, must surely, unless it can be neutralized by some 

 countervailing argument, be allowed to constitute a probability. 

 The united force arising from the constant repetition of these ana- 

 logies, without the occurrence of one solitary analogy of a con- 



