316 ^ag Strmmrs, (Sssags, mttr JjWmfes. [xm. 



no less certain that the conditions in question must 

 exercise a selective influence in favour of (a) and against 

 (6), so that (a) will tend to predominance, and (6) to 

 extirpation. 



That M. Flourens should be unable to perceive the 

 logical necessity of these simple arguments, which lie at 

 the foundation of all Mr. Darwin's reasoning; that he 

 should confound an irrefragable deduction from the 

 observed relations of organisms to the conditions which 

 lie around them, with a metaphysical "forme substan- 

 tielle," or a chimerical personification of the powers 

 of Nature, would be incredible, were it not that other 

 passages of his work leave no room for doubt upon 

 the subject 



" On imagine une Election naturelle qne, pour plus de management, 

 on me dit etre inconsciente, sans s'apercevoir que le contre-sens litte'ral 

 est pre"cisement la: Election inconsciente." (P. 52.) 



"J'ai dej'a dit ce qu'il faut penser de Selection naturelle. Ou 

 Selection naturelle n'est rien, on c'est la nature : mais la nature doue"e 

 Selection, mais la nature personninee: deraiere -erreur du dernier 

 siecle: Le xix* ne fait plus de personnifications." (P. 63.) 



M. Flourens cannot imagine an unconscious selection 

 it is for him a contradiction in terms. Did M. 

 Flourens ever visit one of the prettiest watering-places 

 of " la belle France," the Baie d'Arcachon ? If so, he 

 will probably have passed through the district of the 

 Landes, and will have had an opportunity of observing 

 the formation of " dunes " on a grand scale. What are 

 these " dunes V 9 The winds and waves of the Bay of 

 Biscay have not much consciousness, and yet they have 

 with great care "selected," from among an infinity of 

 masses of silex of all shapes and sizes, which have been 

 submitted to their action, all the grains of sand below a 

 certain size, and have heaped them by themselves over 

 a great area. This sand has been "unconsciously 

 selected " from amidst the gravel in which it first lay 



