474 



NA TURE 



[March 20, 1884 



Lubbock, and olher gentlemen, have signified their inten- 

 tion of being present and supporting the resolutions which 

 are to be submitted to the meeting. 



We beg to refer tliose of our readers who are interested in 

 this subject to the articles published during the past year 

 in Na tuRe, and to the arguments advanced in support of 

 the proposal to found such a laboratory, together with a 

 sketch of the relation of zoological science to the well- 

 being of British fisheries, in the address on the Scien- 

 tific Results of the Fisheries Exhibition delivered by 

 Prof. Ray Lankester at the conference on July 19, and 

 published by the Exhibition Committee. 



THE UNITY OF NA TURE 

 The Unity cf Nat 117-c'. By the Duke of Argyll. (London: 

 Strahan, 1884.) 



THIS book is in our judgment a dreary failure. 

 Although in the mere matter of style it is a well 

 written popular e-xposition of what we may call the com- 

 fortable way of looking at things, in all matters of deeper 

 importance it is utterly barren. Throughout its five or 

 six hundred pages there is no single original observation 

 in science, nor any single original thought in anything 

 that deserves to be called philosophy. Moreover, if re- 

 garded only as an exposition, the first chapters are tedious 

 on account of the redundant manner in which elementary 

 science is explained, while the later chapters, in which 

 the author's views on various philosophical questions are 

 unfolded, display a feebleness of thought and argument 

 which renders them even more tedious than the earlier 

 ones. In short, the successive essays strongly remind 

 us of a series of Scottish sermons. There is everywhere 

 a narrow consistency in the doctrine, which is presented 

 in a rhetorical precision of style ; but the discussion 

 never seems to get below the surface, while even surface 

 difficulties are either unperceived or intentionally avoided. 

 On this account the discussion itself tends to illus- 

 trate the principle of "unity" with which it is con- 

 cerned ; it begins, continues, and ends in a monotone. 

 No matter how fearfully out of tune this may be with any 

 of the notes struck by the greatest men of our time, the 

 Duke of Argyll, like a Highland piper, is deaf to every 

 other music, and drowns all else in the one continuous 

 drone of his own particular instrument. 



The pages of a scientific journal are not suited to an 

 examination in any detail of the parts of the book to 

 which these general remarks apply. We shall, therefore, 

 proceed to examine the more purely scientific strands 

 which are woven into the texture of the work. In this 

 connection the chief topic which meets us is that of 

 " .A.nimal Instinct in Relation to the Mind of Man." 

 Here the main question which is dealt with — that as to 

 the mode of origin and development of instincts — appears 

 to us most inefficiently treated. The object of the writer 

 is to argue that the phenomena of instinct point directly 

 to the design of a Creator, v/ho correlates instinct with 

 structure and environment. So far, of course, every 

 evolutionist, who is also a theist, may go. But, in order 

 to enforce this view, the Duke proceeds to argue that the 

 phenomena in cjuestion are of so mysterious a nature 

 that it is not possible to point to any causes of a proxi- 



mate or physical kind which may reasonably be supposed 

 to produce them. Now it would be easy to show — were 

 this the place to show it — that the writer has here adopted 

 a weak position even as an apologist ; but, to consider 

 the matter only from the side of science, surely it shows 

 some grave want either of judgment or of consideration 

 to make the kind of statements of which the following 

 may be taken as fair examples : — 



" I can therefore see no light in this new exphnation 

 to account for the existence of instincts which are 

 certainly antecedent to all individual experience — the 

 explanation, namely, that they are due to the experience 

 of progenitors 'organised in the race.' It involves 

 assumptions contrary to the analogies of nature, and at 

 variance with the fundamental facts, which are the best, 

 and indeed the only, basis of the theory of evolution. 

 There is no probability — there is hardh' any possibility— 

 in the supposition that experience has had, in past times, 

 some connection with instinct which it has ceased to have 

 in the present day. . . . There was a time when animal 

 life, and with it animal instincts, began to be. But we 

 have no reason whatever to suppose that the nature of 

 instinct then or since has ever been different from its 

 niture now. On the contrary, as we have in nature 

 examples of it in infinite variety, from the very lowest to 

 the very highest forms of organisation, and as the same 

 phenomena are everywhere repeated, we have the best 

 reason to conclude that, in the past, animal instinct has 

 ever been what we now see it to be — congenital, innate, 

 and wholly independent of experience." 



Such passages as these scarcely admit of comment, 

 because all that can be said about them is that the writer 

 has either never read, or has completely forgotten, the 

 whole of the literature to which he alludes. No evolu- 

 tionist has ever entertained the suicidal " supposition that 

 experience has had, in past times, some connection with 

 instinct which it has ceased to have in the present day ; " 

 and the conclusion that in the absence of so absurd a 

 supposition the only alternative is to regard instinct as 

 always having been wholly independent of experience is 

 a conclusion which stands in direct opposition to all that 

 constitutes " evolution " a " theory." Of course no one 

 is bound to accept this theory ; it may be rejected, or it 

 may be left unmentioned ; but it is futile to set up a non- 

 sensical form of words, and then to call the absurdity the 

 " theory of evolution." 



And these are no mere chance expressions, which, if 

 standing alone, might be indicative only of carelessness. 

 The whole of the dissertation on instinct is pervaded by 

 a similar misapprehension, or want of apprehension, of 

 the fundamental ideas of the newer philosophy which the 

 writer appears to suppose that he is considering. Thus, 

 he fails to perceive that the doctrine of natural selection 

 has any bearing upon the subject, while, with reference to 

 the factor of what Mr. Daru-in called " inherited habit," 

 he says : — 



" If the habits and powers which are now purely innate 

 and instinctive were once less innate and more deliberate, 

 then it will follow that the earlier faculties of animals 

 have been higher, and that the later faculties are the 

 lower in the scale of intelligence. This is hardly con- 

 sistent with the accepted idea of evolution," &:c. 



Comment is needless. We shall, therefore, notice only 

 one other point with reference to the essay on instinct, 



