XL] 



MR. DARWIN'S CRTTTCS. 



253 



is more of an evolutionist than Mr. Wallace, because 

 Mr. Wallace thinks it necessary to call in an intelligent 

 agent a sort of supernatural Sir John Sebright to pro- 

 duce even the animal frame of man ; while Mr. Mivart 

 requires no Divine assistance till he comes to man's soul. 



Thus there is a considerable divergence between Mr. 

 Wallace and Mr. Mivart. On the other hand, there are 

 some curious similarities between Mr. Mivart and the 

 Quarterly Reviewer, and these are sometimes so close, 

 that, if Mr. Mivart thought it worth while, I think he 

 might make out a good case of plagiarism against the 

 Reviewer, who studiously abstains from quoting him. 



Both the Reviewer and Mr. Mivart reproach Mr. 

 Darwin with being, " like so many other physicists," 

 entangled in a radically false metaphysical system, and 

 with setting at nought the first principles of both 

 philosophy and religion. Both enlarge upon the neces- 

 sity of a sound philosophical basis, and both, I venture 

 to add, make a conspicuous exhibition of its absence. 

 The Quarterly Reviewer believes that man " differs more 

 from an elephant or a gorilla than do these from 

 the dust of the earth on which they tread," and Mr. 

 Mivart has expressed the opinion that there is more dif- 

 ference between man and an ape than there is between 

 an ape and a piece of granite. 1 



And even when Mr. Mivart (p. 86) trips in a matter of 

 anatomy, and creates a difficulty for Mr. Darwin out of 

 a supposed close similarity between the eyes of fishes 

 and cephalopods, which (as Gegenbaur and others have 

 clearly shown) does not exist, the Quarterly Reviewer 

 adopts the argument without hesitation (p. 66). 



There is another important point, however, in which it 

 is hard to say whether Mr. Mivart diverges from the 

 Quarterly Reviewer or not. 



1 See the Tablet for March 11, 1871. 



