REV. JOHN GERARD, F.L.S., ON SPECIES AND THEIR ORIGIN. 143 
interesting discussion to be almost entirely confirmatory of the 
main contention to the support of which my paper was directed : 
viz., that while on the one hand we cannot but recognize something 
objectively real at the back of “ species,” we have not yet succeeded 
and probably never shall succeed, in determining the precise 
character of that reality, and are therefore obliged to base our 
definitions, not as strict logic would require, upon genus and 
differentia, but upon differences which appear on the surface in 
phenomena which lie within the range of ordinary observation— 
such, for example, as the oft-quoted sterility of hybrids infer se. 
Here, however, it must be observed there is undoubtedly a danger 
of arguing in a circle, if we think to explain the fact of sterility 
by difference of species and then to form this difference by the fact 
of sterility. 
But, as I have said, the net result of the views now expressed 
appears to be, firstly, that species have a real actual existence in 
the nature of things, and secondly, that no satisfactory explanation 
of specific distinctions is possible apart from a Mind ordaining 
them. 
T may be allowed to remark on one or two particular points. 
Dr. Irving considers it unsatisfactory in regard of phraseology to 
speak of mind as a force (p. 140). I would, however, point out that 
in so speaking I refer to mind 7x action, using the term in its widest 
sense—i.¢., to will, and this, as I hold, is not merely @ force, but the 
only causative force of which we have practical experience. 
Professor Langhorne Orchard (p. 136) takes exception to the 
classification which makes two species of Corvus corone and UC. cornix, 
or of Carduelis elegans and C. caniceps, which he declares to be only 
varieties. As to this, it seems enough to say that, in spite of the 
great authority of the late Professor Newton, the majority of 
ornithologists consider the difference in each case to be specific, as 
may be seen in the case exhibited, in illustration of this very point, 
in the entrance hall of our Natural History Museum. With 
regard to the distinction between primrose and cowslip (Primula 
vulgaris and veris) although Professor Huxley, whom I cited in his 
essay on the Darwinian Hypothesis, declares it with considerable 
emphasis to be a well-established fact that these are only varieties 
and not species, it must be acknowledged that the great majority of 
botanists are of a contrary opinion. 
