268 LIFE AND HABIT. 



whether this or that is really good or ill, is settled, as 

 the proof of the pudding by the eating thereof, i.e., 

 by the rigorous competitive examinations through 

 which most living organisms must pass. Mr. Darwin 

 says that there is no good evidence in support of any 

 great principle, or tendency on the part of the creature 

 itself, which would steer variation, as it were, and keep 

 its head straight, but that the most marvellous adapta- 

 tions of structures to needs are simply the result of 

 small and blind variations, accumulated by the opera- 

 tion of "natural selection," which is thus the main 

 cause of the origin of species. 



Enough has perhaps already been said to make the 

 reader feel that the question wants reopening; I 

 shall, therefore, here only remark that we may assume 

 no fundamental difference as regards intelligence, me- 

 mory, and sense of needs to exist between man and the 

 lowest animals, and that in man we do distinctly see a 

 tendency towards progressive development, operating 

 through his power of profiting by and transmitting his 

 experience, but operating in directions which man can- 

 not foresee for any long distance. We also see this in 

 many of the higher animals under domestication, as 

 with horses which have learnt to canter and dogs which 

 point ; more especially we observe it along the line of 

 latest development, where equilibrium of settled convic- 

 tions has not yet been fully attained. One neither finds 

 nor expects much a priori knowledge, whether in man 

 or beast ; but one does find some little in the beginnings 

 of, and throughout the development of, every habit, at 

 the commencement of which, and on every successive 



