

XV. 



OBJECTIONS TO THE THEOEY OF DESCENT 

 WITH MODIFICATION CONSIDERED. 



Origin of Several writers have misapprehended or 



Species, objected to the term Natural Selection. Some 

 have even imagined that natural selection in- 

 duces variability, whereas it implies only the preservation 

 of such variations as arise and are beneficial to the being 

 under its conditions of life. No one objects to agricul- 

 turists speaking of the potent effects of man's selection ; 

 and in this case the individual difference given by nature, 

 which man for some object selects, must of necessity first 

 occur. Others have objected that the term selection im- 

 plies conscious choice in the animals which become modi- 

 fied ; and it has even been urged that, as plants have no 

 volition, natural selection is not applicable to them ! In 

 the literal sense of the word, no doubt, natural selection 

 is a false term ; but who ever objected to chemists speak- 

 ing of the elective affinities of the various elements ? — 

 and yet an acid can not strictly be said to elect the base 

 with which it in preference combines. It has been said 

 that I speak of natural selection as an active power or 

 Deity ; but who objects to an author speaking of the at- 

 traction of gravity as ruling the movements of the planets ? 

 Every one knows what is meant and is implied by such 

 metaphorical expressions ; and they are almost necessary 



