CHANCE. 193 



of lower forms. But teleology, as it seems to us, still 

 owes an explanation of what has been explained by 

 the theory of selection. The retardation of the lower 

 organisms, notwithstanding the internal pressure and the 

 appointed purpose, is incomprehensible. 



But, it is frequently asked, if you will not hear of 

 a "principle of perfectibility" inherent in organisms 

 (Nageli), of the " divine breath as the inward impulse 

 in the evolutionary history of nature " (Braun), of 

 *' tendency to perfectibility " implanted by the Creator 

 (R. Owen), even of the " striving towards the purpose " 

 (v. Baer), can chance be supposed to have produced 

 these marvellous higher organizations ? To this it may 

 be plainly answered, that this chance, to which purblind 

 humanity allots so great a part wherever the personal 

 interference of a superior Being or the universal "crea- 

 tive and productive principle" is not at hand, has no 

 existence in nature, and that our conviction of the truth 

 of the doctrine of derivation is due to its adjustment 

 of the phenomenal series as causes and effects. Let 

 us remember, and fancy ourselves in possession of, the 

 formula of the universe of Laplace^ by the aid of which 

 all future evolutions might be computed in advance. 

 With our limited powers, it is true, it is retrospec- 

 tively alone that certainty can be approached in the 

 calculation and discrimination of the series. In this 

 we must obliterate the word chance, for causality, as v/e 

 understand it, makes chance entirely superfluous. Any 

 one who transports himself to the commencement of an 

 evolution, who, for instance, fancies himself present at 

 the genesis of the reptiles, may, from his antediluvian 

 observatory, look upon the development of the reptile 



O 



