Alfred Russel Wallace, LL. D. 17 



and discoverer, but not a theorist or philosopher. The development 

 of a consistent philosophy based upon the facts of evolution was impos- 

 sible to him. Mr. Wallace is more inclined to philosophical specula- 

 tions, but he has never been trained in the scientific study of mind, 

 and has therefore fallen a prey to the false theories and conclusions of 

 spiritism. This is his limitation. For myself, I believe that Prof. 

 Haeckel, about whom I am hereafter to speak to you, stands high and 

 clear above all the other advocates of this doctrine as a philosophical 

 evolutionist. 



Da. LEWIS G. JANES : 



It is interesting to note that the subject of this lecture has con- 

 sidered the doctrine of evolution in its higher aspects as related to 

 sociology and religion as well as in its merely physical relations. In 

 biology Dr. Wallace is more of a Darwinian than was Mr. Darwin 

 himself. He attributes to natural selection alone many of those 

 alterations in the structure and coloration of birds and animals which 

 Darwin attributed to sexual selection. In reading his latest work, 

 soon after its publication, under the influence of his cogent arguments 

 backed, as they were, by a strong array of facts, and charmed by his 

 delightfully perspicuous style it seemed to me that his conclusions in 

 most of the cases cited by him were fully justified. At all events, his 

 . arguments must be squarely met by a fair appeal to the facts, in order 

 to invalidate their conclusions. In regard to the question of heredity, 

 however, and the effects of use and disuse in determining variations, I 

 can not help thinking his judgment is at fault. He adopts the doctrine 

 of Dr. Weissmann, that acquired characters are not inherited ; but this 

 doctrine has been recently and, as it appears to me, successfully com- 

 bated by Prof. Theodor Eimer, and the facts with which I am familiar 

 seem to be decidedly against it. Nevertheless, the judgment of so 

 good an observer as Mr. Wallace is entitled to most respectful con- 

 sideration. 



PROF. COPE thanked the audience for their attention and briefly 

 closed the discussion. 



