1870-1882] SPONTANEOUS GENERATION 321 



Animals I give a good additional case of subsequent progeny Letter 235 

 of hairless dog being hairy from effects of first impregnation. 



P.S. 2nd. The suggestion, no doubt, is superfluous, but 

 you ought, I think, to measure extension of mane beyond a 

 line joining front or back of ears, and compare with horse. 

 Also the measure (and give comparison with horse), length, 

 breadth, and depth of hoofs. 



To J. D. Hooker. LeUer 236 



Down, July 12th [1S70]. 



Your conclusion that all speculation about preordination 

 is idle waste of time is the only wise one ; but how difficult 

 it is not to speculate ! My theology is a simple muddle ; I 

 cannot look at the universe as the result of blind chance, yet 

 I can see no evidence of beneficent design, or indeed of 

 design of any kind, in the details. As for each variation that 

 has ever occurred having been preordained for a special* end, 

 I can no more believe in it than that the spot on which each 

 drop of rain falls has been specially ordained. 



Spontaneous generation seems almost as great a puzzle as 

 preordination. I cannot persuade myself that such a multi- 

 plicity of organisms can have been produced, like crystals, in 

 Bastian's 1 solutions of the same kind. I am astonished that, 

 as yet, I have met with no allusion to Wyman's positive 

 statement 2 that if the solutions are boiled for five hours no 

 organisms appear ; yet, if my memory serves me, the solu- 

 tions when opened to air immediately became stocked. 

 Against all evidence, I cannot avoid suspecting that organic 



1 On Sept. 2nd, 1872, Mr. Darwin wrote to Mr. Wallace, in reference 

 to the latter's review of The Beginnings of Life, by H. C. Bastian (1872), 

 in Nature, 1872, pp. 284-99: "At present I should prefer any mad 

 hypothesis, such as that every disintegrated molecule of the lowest forms 

 can reproduce the parent-form ; and that these molecules are universally 

 distributed, and that they do not lose their vital power until heated 

 to such a temperature that they decompose like dead organic particles." 



- " Observations and Experiments on Living Organisms in Heated 

 Water," by Jeffries Wyman, Prof, of Anatomy, Harvard Coll. {Amer. 

 Journ. Set., XLIV., 1867, p. 152. Solutions of organic matter in 

 hermetically sealed flasks were immersed in boiling water for various 

 periods. " No infusoria of any kind appeared if the boiling was prolonged 

 beyond a period of five hours." 



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