22 THE GENESIS OF SPECIES. [CHAP. 



seems also able to coordinate. 6 Nay, " Natural Selection " 

 seems capable of application not only to the building up 

 of the smallest and most insignificant organisms, but even 

 of extension beyond the biological domain altogether, so 

 as possibly to have relation to the stable equilibrium of 

 the solar system itself, and even of the whole sidereal uni- 

 verse. Thus, whether this theory be true or false, all lov- 

 ers of natural science should acknowledge a deep debt of 

 gratitude to Messrs. Darwin and Wallace, on account of its 

 practical utility. But the utility of a theory by no means 

 implies its truth. What do we not owe, for example, to 

 the labors of the Alchemists ? The emission theory of 

 light, again, has been pregnant with valuable results, as still 

 is the Atomic theory, and others which will readily suggest 

 themselves. 



With regard to Mr. Darwin (with whose name, on ac- 

 count of the noble self-abnegation of Mr. Wallace, the 

 theory is in general exclusively associated), his friends may 

 heartily congratulate him on the fact that he is one of the 

 few exceptions to the rule respecting the non-appreciation 

 of a prophet in his own country. It would be difficult to 

 name another living laborer in the field of physical science 

 who has excited an interest so wide-spread, and given rise 

 to so much praise, gathering round him, as he has done, a 

 chorus of more or less completely acquiescing disciples, 

 themselves masters in science, and each the representative 

 of a crowd of enthusiastic followers. 



Such is the Darwinian theory of " Natural Selection," 

 such are the more remarkable facts which it is potent to 



* 



6 See Miiller's work, " Fur Darwin," lately translated into English by 

 Mr. Dallas. Mr. Wallace also predicts the discovery, in Madagascar, of 

 a hawk-moth with an enormously-long proboscis, and he does this on 

 account of the discovery there of an orchid with a nectary from ten to 

 fourteen inches in length. See Quarterly Journal of Science, October, 

 1867, and "Natural Selection," p. 275. 



