The Metaphysics of Darwinism. 107 



&quot;give several instances of various birds which 

 have been known occasionally to lay their egga 

 in other birds nests.&quot; If the cuckoo s deviation 

 were as fortuitous as these, if it had no predeter 

 mining and abiding ground in the constitution of 

 the cuckoo, how came it alone to develop into an 

 instinct, when all the advantages accruing in this 

 case were presumably operative in the others, 

 too? This marriage with fortuity really ham 

 pers the single-eyed achievement of Darwin. Di 

 vorcing his science therefrom, he elsewhere ad 

 mirably describes his position in these words : 

 &quot; If it can be shown that instincts do vary ever 

 so little, then I can see no difficulty in Natural 

 Selection preserving and continually accumulat 

 ing variations of instinct to any extent that was 

 profitable. It is thus, as I believe, that all the 

 most complex and wonderful instincts have origi 

 nated.&quot; Here, as always, everything is assumed 

 with the variations. And their character can 

 only be determined by direct observation and by 

 inference from what they effect ; and neither of 

 these methods justifies us in calling them fortui 

 tous. 



When we pass from instinct to organ, we are 

 still in the presence of analogous facts. The 

 question is, How was the eye, with all its inimi- 



