MARKS OF MIND IN NATURE. 309 



were passing away as heavily lacleu. Now, however, every- 

 thing was suggestive of order. The articles had been in the 

 hands of men employed on purpose to select, (.-lassify, and 

 mark off, for despatch to the Rhine. Evidences of intelli- 

 gence were clear in bringing like to like — swords were by 

 themselves, rifles by themselves, and so with other forms.' 

 All were thus more readily available than they would have 

 been had no distribution according to kind taken place. 

 Now science has rendered a service analogous to this in con- 

 nection with the phenomena and facts of Nature. Astronomy 

 has done it for the heavens, by arranging the star worlds in 

 groups for the purpose of study. Geology has done it for 

 the earth's crust by arranging groups of strata in the order 

 •and sequence of superposition, giving us the geological 

 record. Zoology does it for the animal kingdom and Botany 

 does it for the vegetable kingdom. Classification is thus 

 virtually the expression of the order which everywhere exists 

 in Nature. What to the uneducated eye seems only an 

 agglomeration of diversities becomes in the hands of the 

 trained observer (say a zoologist) a series of groups, each 

 group consisting of animals whose form and structure 

 warrant their association, notwithstanding the fact that 

 there are features in each group which are common to all. 

 Huxley shrewdly characterised the method of study indicated 

 here as the application of " trained common sense." And in 

 the Introduction to the Classification of Animals (18(39), he 

 ;Says : " Every animal has something in common with all its 

 fellows ; much with many of them ; more with a few ; and, 

 usually, so much with several, that it differs little from them." 

 There are then " gradations of likeness in animal structures." 

 Systemists do not determine them. They only interpret 

 them, and their interpretation is the testimony of experts 

 to the presence of order, throughout all the differences 

 manifest in animal groups. Were we to say " every species " 

 instead of " every animal," this prevalence of order would 

 even be more evident and suggestive. The very exist- 

 ence of species implies a history of orderly life steps, 

 every one of which was as sharply defined, though 

 immature, as their aggregate in the mature form. 

 Without claiming for these assertions the value of 

 logical inference, they at least entitle us to postulate 

 (1) that every species holds something which is common 

 to it with every other species. There is a common sub- 

 .stance in which and through which Avhat has ever been 



