NATURAL SELECTION CRITICISED. 297 



to speak, to the camp (the leopard is to be found in 

 the grandfather). It is from the camp that I think I 

 derive the story of the hair on the arm growing down- 

 wards from shoulder to elbow, but just in the contrary 

 direction from elbow to wrist, because our sometime 

 ancestor stood in the rain with his hands folded over 

 the head, although it is to be supposed that he might 

 have run, poor devil, into his cave ; or, indeed, it might 

 be asked, How was it with him when he was yet on all- 

 fours ? Still there come a sufficiency of such stories 

 from Mr. Darwin himself, as Hearne the Hunter, or say 

 this of the conversion of a fish into a bird : " See- 

 ing that we have flying birds and mammals, flying 

 insects, and formerly had flying reptiles, it is conceiv- 

 able " it is conceivable ! " that flying fish might have 

 been modified into perfectly- winged animals." 



This (Origin, p. 140) is a perfectly fair specimen of 

 Mr. Darwin's usual ratiocination ; and, of course, it may 

 carry conviction home to most people who are contented 

 with a picture for argument ; but still, in strict logic it 

 is no more than a gesticulation in the air. The fact is, 

 that of the two judgments which are named by Kant, 

 the one the " subsuming," and the other the " reflecting," 

 judgment, it is Mr. Darwin's habit to use only the latter. 

 He hunts, with that quick family imagination of his, for 

 a generate to a certain number of particulars. He has 

 first these latter, a mixed, disunited, plurality of parti- 

 culars, which he cannot help seeing with an uneasy 

 desire of unity ; and as a universal or general rule or 

 proposition really does not exist under which it (the 

 plurality) or they (the particulars) would, as a matter of 

 course, naturally and logically fall, he finds himself 

 unconsciously driven to look about him for the discovery 

 of one, or, in ultimate resort, at least for its invention. 

 But such rule or universal being scarcely ever a true 



