Alfred Russel Wallace 



** the few simple elements available in air, earth and 

 water." I think you may take it from me that this does 

 not admit of dispute. . . . 



At any rate we are in agreement as to Natural Selec- 

 tion being capable of explaining evolution " from amoeba 

 to man." 



It is generally admitted that that is a mechanical or 

 scientific explanation. That is to say, it invokes nothing 

 but intelligible actions and causes. 



De Vries, however, asserts that the Darwinian theory is 

 not scientific at all, and that is of course a position he has 

 a right to take up. 



But if we admit that it is scientific, then we are pre- 

 cluded from admitting a ^' directive power." 



This was von Baer's position, also that of Kant and of 

 Weismann. 



But von Baer remarks that the naturalist is not precluded 

 from asking " whether the totality of details leads him to a 

 general and final basis of intentional design." I have no 

 objection to this, and offer it as an olive-branch which you 

 can throw to your howling and sneering critics. 



As to '' structures organised to serve certain definite 

 purposes," surely they offer no more difficulty as regards 

 *' scientific " explanation than the apparatus by which an 

 orchid is fertilised. 



We can work back to the amoeba to find ourselves face 

 to face with a scarcely organised mass of protoplasm. And 

 then we find ourselves face to face with a problem which 

 will, perhaps, for ever remain insoluble scientifically. 

 But as for that, so is the primeval material of which 

 it (protoplasm) is composed. '' Matter " itself is evaporat- 

 ing, for it is being resolved by physical research into some- 

 thing which is intangible. 



We cannot form the slightest idea how protoplasm 



96 



