EVOLUTION OF MIND. 



IT seems hardly credible that there should exist people 

 who profess to accept the Darwinian theory of develop- 

 ment of species in all its fulness, and yet reject the idea 

 of the human mind having been evolved by slow stages 

 from the primitive sense-organ of our lowliest ancestors, 

 the Protamnia. Such inconsistency seems almost puerile, 

 .and, were 7T not for the fact that the admission of this 

 truth would be the final blow at the various faiths of the 

 world, we should not be called upon to-day to defend a 

 position so utterly impregnable as that assumed by 

 Haeckel and others in regard to the evolution of the 

 human mind. When education has advanced further 

 there will, we must hope, be less of this shutting of the 

 eyes to obvious truths for the mere sake of propping up 

 for a little while longer the belief in a batch of fairy 

 tales and preposterous legends. As we look around us 

 upon the wonderful objects of nature we see everywhere 

 animation and law ; the heavens above are full of life 

 suns, planets, moons, and other celestial bodies in- 

 cessantly moving to and fro, all bound in their courses 

 by the immutable laws of nature ; the vast ocean, teeming 

 with myriads of living beings, is incessantly rolling and 

 -roaring like some great monster, but never exceeds the 

 limits which nature has assigned to its action ; and the 

 whole face of the earth presents a constant scene of 

 activity of some kind or other volcanoes discharging 

 their molten fluid, huge glaciers grinding along the 

 ground, monster rivers rushing forward with incessant 

 roar, and the vegetable and animal kingdoms increasing 

 and multiplying at a marvellous pace. All this is life 

 in fact, everything we see around us, of whatever form 

 or shape, is life of some sort. The very ground upon 

 which we stand is full of life, each particle of dust being 



