TELEOLOGT, OLD AND NEW. 373 



services rendered by my father to the study of nat- 

 ural history is the revival of teleology. The evolu- 

 tionist studies the purpose or meaning of organs 

 with the zeal of the older teleology, but with far 

 wider and more coherent purpose. He has the in- 

 vigorating knowledge that he is gaining, not isolated 

 conceptions of the economy of the present, but a 

 coherent view of both past and present. And even 

 where he fails to discover the use of any part, he 

 may, by a knowledge of its structure, unravel the 

 history of the past vicissitudes in the life of the 

 species. In this way a vigor and unity is given to 

 the study of the forms of organized beings, which 

 before it lacked." ' 



1 According to the Duke of Argyll : " The theory of develop- 

 ment is not only consistent with teleological explanations, but 

 it is founded on teleology and on nothing else. It sees in every- 

 thing the results of a system which is ever acting for the best, 

 always producing something more perfect or more beautiful than 

 before, and incessantly eliminating whatever is less faulty or less 

 perfectly adapted to every new condition. Prof. Tyndall him- 

 self cannot describe this system without using the most in- 

 tensely anthropopsychic language. ' The continued effort of 

 animated nature,' he says in his Belfast address, ' is to improve 

 its conditions and raise itself to a loftier level.'" "The Unity 

 of Nature," p. 171. 



Mr. Alfred Wallace, who shares with Darwin the honor of 

 having introduced to the world the theory of natural selection, 

 asks, when speaking of the bearing of Evolution on the doctrine 

 of design : " Why should we suppose the machine, too compli- 

 cated to have been designed by the Creator, so complete that it 

 would necessarily work out harmonious results ? The theory 

 of ' continual interference' is a limitation of the Creator's power. 

 It assumes that He could not work by pure law in the organic 

 as he has done in the inorganic world." " Natural Selection," 

 p. 280. 



Similar language is employed by the late Prof. Richard 

 Owen, one of the greatest comparative anatomists of the age. 

 He was a firm believer not only in the "ordained becoming" 

 of new species, but was also a zealous and consistent teleolo- 

 gist. 



