PROFESSOR VIllCHOW AND EVOLUTION. 049 



early now to ask what progress that bold theory has made 

 in scientific estimation. Since the ' Origin' appeared it 

 has passed through four English editions,* two American, 

 two German, two French, several Russian, a Dutch, and 

 an Italian edition. So far from Natural Selection being a 

 thing of the past [the ' Athenaeum' had stated it to be 

 so] it is an accepted doctrine with almost every philo- 

 sophical naturalist, including, it will always be understood, 

 a considerable proportion who are not prepared to admit 

 that it accounts for all Mr. Darwin assigns to it." In the 

 following year, at Innsbruck, Helmholtz took up the same 

 ground. f Another decade has now passed, and he is 

 simply blind who cannot see the enormous progress made 

 by the theory during that time. Some of the outward and 

 visible signs of this advance are readily indicated. The 

 hostility and fear which so long prevented the recognition 

 of Mr. Darwin by his own university have vanished, and 

 this year Cambridge, amid universal acclamation, con- 

 ferred on him her Doctor's degree. The Academy of 

 Sciences in Paris, which had so long persistently closed its 

 doors against Mr. Darwin, has also yielded at last; while 

 sermons, lectures, and published articles plainly show that 

 even the clergy have, to a great extent, become acclimatized 

 to the Darwinian air. My brief reference to Mr. Darwin 

 in the Birmingham Address was based upon the knowledge 

 that such changes had been accomplished, and were still 

 going on. 



That the lecture of Professor Virchow can, to any 

 practical extent, disturb this progress of public faith in the 

 theory of evolution, I do not believe. That the special 

 lessons of caution which he inculcates were exemplified by 

 me, years before his voice was heard upon this subject, has 



* Published by Mr. John Murray, the English publisher of Vir- 

 chow's lecture. Bane and antidote are thus impartially distributed 

 by the same hand. 



{ 4< Noch besteht lebhafter Streit urn die Wahrheit oder Wahr- 

 scheinlichkeit von Darwin's Theorie; er dreht sich aber doch eigent- 

 lich nur uni die Grenzen, welche wir fur die Veranderlichkeit der 

 Arten annehinen diirfen. Dass innerhalb derselben Species erbliche 

 Racenverschiedenheiten auf die von Darwin beschriebene Weise zu 

 kommen konnen, ja dass viele der bisher als verschiedene Species 

 derselben Gattung betrachteten Formen von derselben Urforiu 

 abstaininen, werden auch seine Gegner kauni leugnen." (Populdre 

 Vortrage.) 



