48 EXPLANATIONS. 



— but does he know the signs by which such a 

 transition could be detected? lam aware of 

 none. He says the new species are sharply de- 

 fined — that is, strongly distinct ; and so they may 

 be, without any prejudice to the transmutation 

 theory — as far, at least, as I understand it. And 

 here he remarks that there are the same diffi- 

 culties in the way of his theory, " both in the 

 grouping of each separate system, and in the 

 passage from one system to another ; and that is 

 true, whatever part of the ascending geological 

 series we choose to take between the lowest 

 formations and the highest." As he does not 

 state the nature of the difficulties, I cannot under- 

 take to say what argument or what reconstruc- 

 tion of my system may be necessary to meet 



to express surprise at finding Dr. Whewell participating in 

 the mere ignorance of the first two of the above-mentioned 

 journals. In the preface to a volume which he has recently 

 published under the title of Indications of the Creator, he meets 

 my arguments with a crude and incorrect view of the fossil 

 history, commencing with this sentence — " Vertebrate animals 

 do exist in the Silurian rocks, from which the assi-rted law 

 [that of development] excludes them." The existence of a 

 non-pisciferous formation had been unknown to him. Many of 

 the objections made to the development theory, in obscurer 

 quarters, rest on errors of a similar kind. 



