332 THE GENESIS OF SPECIES. [CHAP. 



Some apology is due to the reader for certain observa- 

 tions and arguments which have been here advanced, and 

 which have little in the shape of novelty to recommend 

 them. But, after all, novelty can hardly be predicated of 

 the views here criticised and opposed. Some of these seem 

 almost a return to the "fortuitous concourse of atoms" 

 of Democritus, and even the very theory of "Natural 

 Selection" itself a " survival of the fittest" was in part 

 thought out not hundreds but thousands of years' ago. 

 Opponents of Aristotle maintained that by the accidental 

 occurrence of combinations, organisms have been preserved 

 and perpetuated such as final causes, did they exist, would 

 have brought about, disadvantageous combinations or vari- 

 ations being speedily exterminated. " For when the very 

 same combinations happened to be produced which the 

 law of final causes would have called into being, those 

 combinations which proved to be advantageous to the 

 organism were preserved; while those which were not 

 advantageous perished, and still perish, like the minotaurs 

 and sphinxes of Empedocles." 1 



In conclusion, the author ventures to hope that this 

 treatise may have contributed, however slightly, towards 

 clearing the way for peace and conciliation and for a more 

 ready perception of the harmony which exists between 

 the deductions from our primary intuitions and the teach- 

 ings of physical science, so far, that is, as concerns the 

 evolution of organic forms the genesis of species. 



The aim has been to support the doctrine that these 



1 Quoted from the Rambler of March 1860, p. 364 : ""OTTOV /xez> olv 

 awat/ra avv^t] a.7TTfp KO.V ft ej/e::x TOI eytpero, rovra /xty Vwfoj OTTO rov 

 aiTO/J.tTOV crvfrrdvTa eVtTTjSetas, orra 5e p.'}\ OU'TCOS aTT^Aero /cat aTroAAurcu, 

 Kad.'TTfo 'E/nreSo/cAT^s Aryet T " fiovyevfj /cot ovSpoirpwpa." ARIST. Phys. ii. 

 c. 8. 



