v MR. DARWIN'S CRITICS 135 



concluditur, fonnns substantiales materiales non fieri ex nihilo, 

 quia fiunt ex materia, quae in suo genere per se concurrit, et 

 influit ad esse, et fieri talium formarum ; quia, sicut esse non 

 possunt nisi affixae materiae, a qua sustententur in esse : ita nee 

 fieri possunt, nisi earum effectio et penetratio in eadem materia 

 sustentetur. Et haee est propria et per se differentia inter 

 effectionem ex nihilo, et ex aliquo, propter quam, ut infra 

 ostendemus, prior modus efficiendi superat vim finitam natu- 

 raliam agentium, nou vero posterior. 



"14. Ex his etiam constat, proprie de his formis dici non 

 creari, sed educi de potentia inateriae. " l 



If I may venture to interpret these hard say- 

 ings, Suarez conceives that the evolution of 

 substantial forms in the ordinary course of nature, 

 is conditioned not only by the existence of the 

 materia prima, but also by a certain " concurrence 

 and influence " which that materia exerts ; and 

 every new substantial form being thus conditioned, 

 and in part, at any rate, caused*, by a pre-existing 

 .something, cannot be said to be created out of 

 nothing. 



But as the whole tenor of the context shows, 

 Suarez applies this argumentation merely to the 

 evolution of material substantial forms in the 

 ordinary course of nature. How the substantial 

 forms of animals and plants primarily originated, 

 is a question to which, so far as I am able to 

 discover, he does not so much as allude in his 

 " Metaphysical Disputations." Nor was there any 

 necessity that he should do so, inasmuch as he 



1 Suarez, loc. cit. Disput. xv. ii. 



