336 LESSONS FEOM NATURE. [CHAP. XL 



tainly correct in this sense when he says that it is not to 

 what is now known as &quot;Darwinism&quot; that the prevalence of 

 the doctrine of evolution is to be attributed, or indirectly 

 assigned. The part of Mr. Darwin s theory which is old is 

 that which attributes so much importance to the destructive 

 powers of nature, a view advocated by Lucretius and treated 

 of by Aristotle in the passage quoted in my book. 



&quot; What, however, was unquestionably Mr. Darwin s own, 

 was the remarkable conception that this exterminating 

 power, acting upon organisms presenting slight variations, 

 so overbore all other influences as to occasion the survival of 

 the fittest variations, and in this way (by a process of cutting 

 off and limiting) fixed the characters of the different organic 

 species, thus becoming their origin. The origin, not, of course, 

 of the slight variations, but of the fixing of these in definite 

 lines and grooves. 



&quot; Gradually, however, the arguments of opponents have 

 forced upon Mr. Darwin s active mind modifications of his 

 views, till, as I have said, he has come to admit in principle that 

 Natural Selection is not the origin of species. I cannot myself 

 see that there is, in this change of view, anything at all dero 

 gatory to Mr. Darwin ; and for ray part, my esteem is strength 

 ened rather than weakened when I read candid admissions of 

 antecedent error. These admissions should not be brought 

 forward, save when an unscientific appeal is made to his 

 authority, or when an advocate more Zealous than judicious 

 attempts to deny that Mr. Darwin s opinions have undergone 

 any grave modifications. Then indeed truth and justice 

 demand the production of such admissions. They do so since 

 the assignment of the law of Natural Selection to a sub 

 ordinate place is manifestly an abandonment of the Dar 

 winian theory as originally proposed; for how can that be said 

 to be the origin of species which only co-operates, in an infe 

 rior and comparatively uniufluential manner, in determining 

 that origin ? 



&quot;Mr. Chauncey Wright s remarks seem to me then to 

 render necessarv a reference to the earlier statements of Mr. 



