NA TURE 



141 



THURSDAY, JUNE 12, 1879 



EVOLUTION, OLD AND NEW 

 Evolution, Old and New; or, The Theories of Buffon, 

 Dr. Erasmics Darwin, and Lamarck, as compared with 

 that of Mr. Charles Darwin. By Samuel Butler. (Op. 

 4.) (London : Hardwicke and Bogue, 1879.) 



THE present work will not add to the reputation of the 

 author of " Life and Habit." It is, nevertheless, an 

 interesting and useful book, inasmuch as it gives a pretty 

 full account of the theories and opinions of several authors 

 whose writings are almost unknown to the present genera- 

 tion of naturalists. The sketch of the lives, and the 

 numerous quotations from the works of the celebrated 

 men named in the title page, are instnactive and some- 

 times amusing. Quotations are also given from Mr. Patrick 

 Matthew, Etienne and Isidore Geoffroy St. Hilaire, and 

 Herbert Spencer, illustrating their views on evolution, and 

 giving altogether a fair idea of the progress of modern 

 thought on this important subject. But the main object 

 of the book is to show that all these authors have been 

 right, while Mr. Charles Darwin is altogether wrong ; and 

 that the works of the former contain a more philosophical, 

 more accurate, and altogether superior view of the nature 

 and causes of evolution in the organic world than those 

 of the latter. 



Mr. Butler finds in all the writers whose views he 

 advocates, opinions which agree more or less closely with 

 those so ingeniously and forcibly developed by himself, 

 and to which full justice has already been done in the 

 pages of Nature (vol. xix. p. 479). No one can object 

 to his adducing these points of agreement to fortify his 

 own position, or to his arguing that his own hypotheses, 

 thus supported, form an important and even a necessary 

 supplement to the theory advocated by Mr. Darwin. But 

 he goes much further than this, and maintains that the 

 action of external conditions, combined with the desires 

 and habits of animals, are the all-powerful causes of evolu- 

 tion, and that " natural selection," or " survival of the 

 fittest," is comparatively unimportant, and is quite un- 

 worthy of the position given to it by Mr. Darwin and his 

 followers. In doing this he not only falls into much 

 confusion as to the phenomena of variation, but indulges 

 in an amount of petty verbal criticism, quite unworthy of 

 the high reputation established by his previous work ; and 

 I believe that naturalists in general will endorse the remark 

 in my review of "Life and Habit" (which Mr. Butler 

 has, apparently under the impression that this volume 

 refutes it, placed in a conspicuous position on the fly-leaf 

 of his book), that " the want of a practical acquaintance 

 with natural history leads the author to take an erroneous 

 view of the bearing of his own theories on those of Mr. 

 Darwin." 



In discussing the views and arguments of Buflfon, Mr. 

 Butler suggests that the numerous contradictory state- 

 ments of this eminent writer are due to the necessity he 

 was under of not arousing the enmity of the Church. 

 He therefore adopts the method of directly contradicting 

 himself whenever he has been a little too advanced. 

 Over and over again he points out the evidence of the 

 several families of animals and plants having each had a 

 Vol. XX. — No. 502 



common ancestor, and he specially mentions the horse 

 and the ass, man and apes, as having been thus derived. 

 But he puts it all hypothetically, and then, to satisfy the 

 Sorbonne and the public, he proceeds thus : " But no ! 

 It is certain from revelation that all animals have alike 

 been favoured with the grace of an act of direct creation, 

 and that the first pair of every species issued full formed 

 from the hands of the Creator." These, and numerous 

 other passages quoted, certainly support the theory that 

 many of Buffon' s statements are ironical ; and that while 

 himself a firm believer in the development of all organ- 

 isms from common ancestors, he purposely contradicted 

 himself sufficiently to prevent the suppression of his work 

 as being opposed to religion. 



Most interesting among the quotations from Buffon, 

 however, are those which show how near he was to seizing 

 upon the idea of "selection" as a means of modifying 

 organisms. Thus he says : — "The dog is short-lived ; he 

 breeds often and freely ; he is perpetually under the eye 

 of man ; hence when — by some chance common enough 

 with nature — a variation or special feature has made its 

 appearance, man has tried to perpetuate it by uniting 

 together the individuals in which it has appeared, as 

 people do now who wish to form new breeds of dogs and 

 other animals." And again, in discussing the origin of 

 our cultivated fruits, &c., he says : " It was only by sow- 

 ing, tending, and bringing to maturity an almost infinite 

 number of plants of the same kind that he was able to 

 recognise some individuals with fruits sweeter and better 

 than others." Here he clearly recognises the selection 

 of individual variations as the source of varieties, and 

 the necessity for breeding or growing on a large scale, in 

 order to obtain such individual variations as are required. 

 But he never laid hold of this idea with any firmness ; for 

 we find him elsewhere dwelling on the influence of change 

 of climate, food, and treatment, as having produced the 

 changes in domestic animals and cultivated plants ; espe- 

 cially change of climate while accompanying man in his 

 migrations, and the action of these changes on habits 

 "influencing their natures, instincts, and most inward 

 qualities." 



We next come to Dr. Erasmus Darwin, of whose life, 

 writings, and opinions a very interesting account is given, 

 and who is an especial favourite of Mr. Butler on account 

 of his views as to the transmission of memory and habit 

 from parent to offspring, and as to the existence of sensa- 

 tion and voluntary motion in plants, although he laid 

 more stress on imitation and instruction than on inherited 

 habits, and in this departs widely from Mr. Butler. Dr. 

 Darwin anticipated Lamarck in arguing that the trans- 

 formations of animals " are in part produced by their 

 own exertions in consequence of their desires and aver- 

 sions, of their pleasures and their pains, or of irritation 

 or of associations ; and many of these acquired forms or 

 propensities are transmitted to their posterity." He also 

 had a glimpse of the mode of action of sexual selection ; 

 for, speaking of the spurs with which the males of many 

 game birds are armed, and which they use in fighting, he 

 says: " The final cause of this contest among the males 

 seems to be that the strongest and most active animal 

 should propagate the species, which should thence be- 

 come improved." We cannot see, however, that he had 

 any clear notion of the general action of the law of the 



