1849.] 



THE CIVIL ENGINEER AND ARCHITECT'S JOURNAL. 



45 



says, a great distinction between vegetables and minerals, for the 

 latter, so far as we know, have a course of existence whicli is un- 

 determined ; but the otliers have a period the bounds of which are 

 limited and in most cases known. 



There are, it is true, great diversities between the lives of plants, 

 some which die almost as soon as born — some, the giants of the 

 forest, which live for centuries ; but the career of each has its 

 bounds. This limitation lias, too, its connection necessarily with 

 the performance of every function of being. Mr. Fergusson 

 speaks with reservation as to the existence of minerals being 

 limited or unlimited ; and this not without good reason, though 

 the common belief and the common systems of philosophy please 

 themselves with the eternity of the mineral structure of the globe. 

 If, however, there is a wide range between the life of an ephemeral 

 fungus and of an aged dragon-tree or oak ; and if, too, there is a 

 wide range, but a less one, between the life of a day-fly and an 

 elephant, a turtle or a raven, so, on the other hand, for aught we 

 know, there may be a wider range which in the mineral kingdom 

 may give thousands of years of being and a limited life to mate- 

 rials which we look upon as lasting for ever. We know that the 

 hardest granite, the best consolidated clay, the purest limestone, 

 had a beginning, and are the resultants of foraier combinations. 

 We know, too, that there are minerals so fleeting in their form, 

 that they can hardly be preserved or watched (p. 57). These are 

 incident to the machine of the globe, and if the phenomena are 

 not developed as those of individual beings, then they relate to 

 those of the globe itself as an organised body, and are subject to 

 the limitations of condition which the organs of other bodies un- 

 dergo. There is therefore nothing which, in the absence of posi- 

 tive proof, justifies us in believing that the existence of minerals 

 is without a limit, any more than that of plants and beasts. 



We do not know whether INlr. Fergusson establishes a true dis- 

 tinction, when he says of the plants, that though the individual 

 must perish, to all it is given to live on in their ofl^spring, which 

 differ in nothing from themselves; till it becomes more like an 

 oscillation to-and-fro of one individual through an indefinite time, 

 than the limited career between birth and death, which seems the 

 beginning and end of each individual. 



Botanical classification leads the writer to give some cautions on 

 the subject of classification generally. He says truly, that it must 

 be ever borne in mind that no such things as the classes established 

 exist in nature. Classification, indeed, is a legitimate application 

 of theory. In considering the laws of light, we assume the New- 

 tonian or Huygenian theory, not admitting thereby that either 

 represents the true facts or the true results, but taking either as a 

 convenient general system to enable us to follow out consistently 

 the various operations. The mistake of superficial learners is in 

 this — that they believe the direct contrary, and adopt Newton or 

 Huygens as the expounders of facts. The injury to science is the 

 greater, as many are deterred from propounding new theories, 

 which may tend to elucidate the facts. So in the classification of 

 plants or beasts, the classification is only a matter of expediency ; 

 for in nature there is no rosaceous province, no bound within 

 which the feline tribe is restrained. Mr. Fergusson explains that 

 an artificial classification is not to be found in nature, because she 

 works out her problems with a complexity and infinity of detail 

 which man can never comprehend ; and tliough every plant is sub- 

 ject to immutable laws, and perfect regularity reigns, from the 

 minute ultimate particles to the whole aggi-egated kingdom, it is 

 not such a formal arrangement as our classification attempts. 



Mr. Fergusson approves of the retention for their respective 

 purposes of both the Linnean and Jussieuan or natural system, and 

 makes a very useful suggestion, that naturalists should, like gram- 

 marians, admit lists of irregular plants or animals, instead of 

 forcing them into places where they do not fit, or multiplying 

 genera to an inconvenient extent. He would likewise place be- 

 tween each class or genus a list of neuters, which belong equally 

 to either. We would extend his liberality as to the two systems 

 in botany, by using the same toleration in other branches of sci- 

 ence. If the Newtonian theory explains some phenomena which 

 the undulatory does not, why not admit both .'' — for neither New- 

 ton nor Huygens is more than a hearsay witness. A more catholic 

 feeling on these matters is indeed most needful for the right growth 

 of knowledge. 



On proceeding to Zoologj', Mr. Fergusson gives some time to 

 Ontology, the intellectual functions of animals. Here, likewise, 

 he steps out of the common beaten track, and instead of binding 

 himself to the functions of instinct, he holds forth that beasts have 

 minds of the same kind as man. He at once sets aside the a priori 

 arguments derived from the Greek metaphysics and sectarian dog- 

 mata, and takes facts as he finds them. He comes to the answer, 



that the growth of mind agrees with that of brain ; that this law 

 is followed from the lowest polyp to the hugest beast ; that man 

 has more power only by the higher development of his nervous 

 system ; and that his mind does not differ in kind from that of 

 beasts, but only in extent. 



The next section brings us to the knowledge of man, or Anthro- 

 pology. The writer here comes in contact with the two classes of 

 philosophers, one of whom makes man into nothing more than a 

 beast, nearly akin to the monkeys; and the other strives to set 

 liim apart altogether from the beasts, in his zeal to save the ever- 

 lasting soul of man from the beasts that die. Had they, he says, 

 only made their system of metaphysics better, instead of striving 

 to set aside the truths of physiology or psychology, the errors of 

 both would not have happened. The consideration of man in this 

 respect is twofold — first, for his body, which belongs to zoology; 

 and second, as a being having properties and faculties of which no 

 other beasts have the like. 



If, in body and in mind, man partakes of the same nature with 

 these, yet his works show us that he has other and higher powers, 

 and a higher destiny. Mr. Fergusson thinks that these are exem- 

 plified in the division of labour or employment, and in progress ; 

 neither of which is exemplified by the beasts. We do not think 

 his premises support his conclusions, nor that he has here well 

 wrought out his own system. As we said before, we consider that 

 the special distinction of man is his subordinate creative power, 

 and Mr. Fergusson's arguments are a proof of this. No other 

 living being has the like power, and the organization of man is the 

 instrument for developing this. 



Mr. Fergusson says, very ingeniously (p. 65), after speaking of 

 the division of employment, that in a civilised commonwealth like 

 England, it would be easy to share out its twenty millions of 

 people into a thousand classes, as distinct in their functions and in 

 their action on the material world as the thousand species into 

 which naturalists classify four-footed beasts, and to sub-divide 

 them into a hundred thousand varieties; not only performing all 

 the separate functions of all the separate species of animals, but 

 thousands of functions which the lower beasts do not perform, and 

 have no trace of any power by which tliey might be taught to per- 

 form them. So, too, all the functions which beasts have in a 

 higher degree than man, are by him made use of for his purposes : 

 the fleetness of the horse, the keen scent of the hound, the strength 

 of the elephant, are made by man his servants ; and he engrosses 

 to himself the functions of the animal kingdom — nay, it may be 

 said those of the vegetable and mineral kingdoms. In all this 

 complexity of functions, says the writer, man is still one genus, 

 and for all practical purposes only one species ; and it is this unity 

 in multiplicity, and multiplicity in unity, which gives him his 

 infinite power over the material universe. 



The writer asserts tlie will and the power to influence the ani- 

 mal and material world ; to alter the breeds of the horse, the dog, 

 or the sheep ; to change the courses of rivers ; to remove forests ; 

 to modify ulimate. The division of employment and the tendency 

 to progress, are only resultants of the original power and organiza- 

 tion which we have defined. 



Mr. Fergusson, in contradistinction to many of the modern 

 schools, holds the essential inequality of men, in their physical, 

 mental, and psychological organization, resulting in an essential 

 inequality of all men in power and position. He allows, however, 

 of a real'aud essential equality of all men in means of enjoyment, 

 and of free will and power to improve or deteriorate their condi- 

 tions. 



He opposes the morphological doctrine of Lamarck and his fol- 

 lowers, tliat one species of animal can be developed out of an- 

 other; and also that* which says that the more perfectly organised 

 species were developed out of those less organised, as the world 

 became fitted for their reception. Upon this Mr. Fergusson re- 

 marks, that if it prove anything, it proves too much ; for in that 

 case, when the world arrived at that state that the amphibia were 

 developed out of the fishes, or the birds out of the amphibia, all 

 the fishes or reptiles ought to have given birth to the more perfect 

 kinds, and perished themselves. So, too, when man was developed, 

 the female monkeys having given birth to him, tlieir own race 

 should have become extinct. There is not, therefore, one fact to 

 support the doctrine. 



iMr. Fergusson, by a single reference, which is all he has given 

 to it, seems to advocate the doctrine of one pair only having given 

 birth to man ; and so with the other animals, — yet, on his own 

 principles, without any sufficient reason. With regard to the 

 human race, unless he adopts the morphological doctrines, which 

 he repudiates elsewhere, he cannot conciliate existing facts. There 



* " Vestiijea of the Natural History of Creation." 



