58 



FACTS AND FANCIES 



mechanical causes." These assumptions as 

 to man and nature pervade the whole book, 

 and of course greatly simplify the task of the 

 writer, as he does not require to account for the 

 primary origin of nature, or for anything in man 

 except his physical frame ; and even this he can 

 regard as a thing altogether mechanical. 



It is plain that we might here enter our 

 dissent from Haeckel's method, for he requires 

 us, before we can proceed a smgle step in the 

 evolution of man, to assume many things 

 which he cannot prove. What evidence is 

 there, for example, of the possibility of the 

 development of the rational and moral nature 

 of man from the intelligence and the instinct 

 of the lower animals, or of the necessary 

 dependence of the phenomena of mind on 

 the structure of brain-cells? The evidence, 

 so far as it goes, seems to tend the other way. 

 What proof is there of the spontaneous evolu- 

 tion of livmg forms from inorganic matter? 

 Experiment so far negatives the possibility 

 of this. Even if we give Haeckel, to begin 

 with, a single living cell or granule of pro- 

 toplasm, we know that this protoplasm must 

 have been produced by the agency of a liv- 

 ing vegetable cell previously existing ; and we 



