POWELL] SOPHIOLOGY CLXXIX 



og'iiized except iiv a A'ao-ue way. The process is called pliv- 

 logeny. Ontogeny, and pliylogeny together are termed 

 evolution. While ontogeny was more or less iully recognized 

 in antiquity, phylogeny was very dimly discerned and it was 

 supposed to be exceedingly restricted; so that while there 

 might be varieties of plants and animals, it was held that all liv- 

 ing creatures are encompassed by barriers beyond which they 

 can not pass. It could be observed that plants and animals 

 gi'ow from germs, but that races grow by minute modifications 

 of germs accumulating through many successive generations 

 was not so easily observed. That the offspring is like the 

 parent is a more conspicuous fact than that the offspring is a 

 modification of the parent. Therefore it was believed that 

 everv existing species is the descendant of a primal species, 

 and the nundjer of primal species has i-emained constant. 

 Finally it was discovered that species become extinct and that 

 species begin at different periods in the world's history: this 

 was revealed by the science of geology. Thus the notion of 

 constancy of species was finally shown to be erroneous, and it 

 has been replaced by the scientific concept of the evolution of 

 species. 



So nnich of what is now commonplace science must be given 

 that we niay understand the doctrine of primordial intuition, 

 which was invented as a defense of mythology. As plants grow 

 from seeds by minute increments through the process of on- 

 togeny, and seeds grow from other seeds by minute increments 

 by the process of phylogeny; as animals grow from eggs b}' mi- 

 nute increments, and as eggs themselves grow from other eggs 

 b}- minute increments, so ideas grow ontogenetically by mimite 

 increments of judgments and also phylogenetically bv minute 

 increments of judgments. Thus the notion grows in the mind of 

 the child by ontogenv, and the idea grows in the mind of the 

 race from generation to generation b}' a process analogous to 

 phylogeny. As man once believed that 2ilants are inexorably 

 limited to specific forms that are constant, as he once believed 

 that animals are limited to specific forms that are constant from 

 generation to generation, so men hnve believed that ideas are 

 limited to specific forms that are constant. That which in plants 



