106 DARWINIAN INTERESTS 



how or where, rather than leave so curious a fact unnoticed. 

 I am glad that you are the only one who has twigged it and 

 its importance. 



Here may be added two extracts from Hooker's letter of 

 February 4, apropos of the reprint. 



The only thing I do not like, and could not conscientiously 

 consult you about, was the passage about a wise Providence 

 ordering &c, &c, or something of that sort (I forget the words, 

 it matters little). 1 It is bosh and unscientific, but I could 

 not resist the opportunity of turning the tables of Providence 

 over those who think and argue the contrary of its intentions, 

 and showing those who will have a Providence in the affair, 

 that yours is the God one, theirs the Devil's. I always felt 

 that if I had to print the Lecture, I should wish these passages 

 cut out, but that this would be dishonest, so it e'en went 

 forth in G.C., and now will further. 



What I mean about Providence is this : — 



I think and believe that all reasoning upon the subject 

 is utterly futile, that there is no such thing in a scientific 

 sense — but that whereas those who deal in it hold that 

 the theory of fixed types is the only one consonant with a 

 belief in a Providence, I hold that they are wrong and that 

 the theory of continuity and variation is the only one con- 

 sonant with the belief. 



Bentham is doing Umbelliferae for Gen. Plant., and finds 

 that the two remarkable umbelliferous genera of Madeira, 

 Monizia and Melanoselinum, are only species of Thapsia, 

 a Mediterranean genus of most remarkable and exceptional 

 habit. Now this is one of those cases of Genera confined 

 to the Island, being then created out of a Continental form ; 

 the genus I suspect not having ever existed on the Continent. 

 It appears to me that it will always be difficult to say whether 

 a genus that has continental allies, is an Insular development, 



1 ' By a wise ordinance it is ruled, that amongst living beings like shall never 

 produce its exact like ; that as no two circumstances in time or place are abso- 

 lutely synchronous, or equal, or similar, so shall no two beings be born alike ; 

 that a variety in the environing conditions in which the progeny of a living 

 being may be placed, shall be met by variety in the progeny itself. A wise 

 ordinance it is, that ensures the succession of being, not by multiplying abso- 

 lutely identical forms, but by varying these, so that the right form may fill 

 its right place in Nature's ever varying economy ' (p. 12). 



