24 MAMMALIAN DESCENT. [LECT. I. 



This speaker, whose power of mental deglutition was so great, was 

 one of our own calling, and, therefore, had undergone a biological 

 training ; surely we may hope that better days are in store for us, 

 when no educated man will be in danger of falling into such a deep 

 pit of belief as this. 



But Man, the only reasoning being we know anything of, can be 

 as unreasonable in his unbelief as in his belief. 



In Mr Mallock's charming little Lucretius^- there are many things 

 a Darwinian longs to quote, but one verse, with the translator's 

 prefatory remarks, may be given : 



" The chance to which our world owes itself, needed infinite atoms 

 for its production, infinite trials, and infinite failures, before the 

 present combination of things arose. 



" ' For blindly, blindly, and without design, 



Did these first atoms their first meetings try ; 

 No ordering thought was there, no will divine 



To guide them ; but through infinite times gone by, 

 Tossed and tormented they essayed to join, 



And clashed through the void space tempestuously, 

 Until at last that certain whirl began, 



Which slowly formed the earth and heaven, and man.' " 



Page 93. 



The reader is also requested to look at the curious, abortive, 

 unreasonable Darwinism of the chapter " On the Origin of Life and 

 Species." Section iv., pp. 45-50. 



Those who care for defunct theories of Creation may find one as 

 good as the rest, but more amusing, in The Birds of Aristophanes? 

 I can only find space for the beginning of this part of the Drama : 



" Before the creation of Ether and Light, 

 Chaos and Night together were plight, 

 In the dungeon of Erebus foully bedight, 

 Nor Ocean, or Air, or Substance was there, 

 Or solid, or rare, or figure, or form, 

 But horrible Tartarus ruled in the storm." Page 30. 



1 William Blackwood & Sons, Edinburgh and London. 1878. 



2 Sir John Hookham Frere's Translation. Cambridge, 1883. 



