1GNORABIMUS ET RESTRINGAMUR. 101 



the preface to the "Evolution of Man," we must 

 raise a decided protest against the air of infalli- 

 bility with which Du Bois-Keymond pronounces 

 that these two problems are insoluble, not only at 

 the present time but to all futurity. The power of 

 development inherent in science and knowledge is 

 hereby simply swept away with a word. Almost 

 every great and difficult problem of knowledge seems 

 to most or all contemporary thinkers insoluble, and 

 every path to the solution of it seems closed, till at 

 last the bold genius appears whose clear sight detects 

 the right path which till then was hidden, and which 

 leads to the required knowledge. We need only call 

 to mind our present doctrine of evolution. The pro- 

 blem of creation the question as to the origin of 

 animal and vegetable species was universally looked 

 upon as transcendental and perfectly insoluble, till the 

 genius of Lamarck established the principles of the 

 theory of descent in his admirable " Philosophic Zoo- 

 logique" in 1809. Nay, even then most and among 

 them the most distinguished biologists thought the 

 problem of creation a quite insoluble mystery, and 

 Darwin was the first to solve it, fifty years later, by 

 his theory of selection in 1859. Hence we venture to 

 assert that there is no scientific problem of which we 

 may dare to say that the mind of man will never solve 

 it even in the remotest future. Well does Darwin 



