24 Permanence and Evolution. 



inexplicable before Newton and his immediate 

 forerunners. But as it was the duty of a scien- 

 tific man to maintain the unfoundedness of the 

 Cartesian vortices and similar pseudo-explana- 

 tions, based on loose analogies and on no real 

 evidence, though himself unable to explain the 

 facts, or even in any way to contribute to or 

 forsee their explanation, so in my opinion is it 

 with Darwinism, etc., now. 



Of other forms of evolutionism I can hardly 

 speak so much, as they scarcely even profess 

 to be scientific hypotheses or more than 

 loose conjectures. Lyell's resolution of past 

 geological phenomena into the effects of ex- 

 isting causes, has often been supposed to 

 afford a parallel to the doctrines of modern 

 evolutionists, but the things are different, not 

 to say extremely opposite. Lyell collected 

 with great care a vast number of instances 

 of the actual operations of aqueous and igneous 

 causes, all carefully and accurately recorded 



