160 ON CERTAIN MODERN VIEWS 



in the different members of the order Primates, but the greatest 

 hiatus does not lie between Man and the anthropoid Apes, but between 

 the Apes and Monkeys and the Lemurs. The Lemur has its cere- 

 bellum partially visible from above, and the posterior lobe, with the 

 contained posterior cornu and hippocampus minor rudimentary. All 

 the other members of the order have the cerebellum entirely hidden 

 by the cerebral lobes, and possess a posterior cornu and hippocam- 

 pus minor well developed. Although the volume of the brain is 

 much greater, proportionally and absolutely, in Man than in the Apes 

 — the brain of the heaviest Gorilla weighing 20 ounces, whilst the 

 largest human brain weighs 65 ounces, and the smallest adult human 

 brain weighs 31 to 32 ounces — yet we must not lay too much stress 

 on these facts, as intellectual power does not depend altogether on the 

 brain. That organ is only one condition on which "intellectual 

 manifestations " depend. The cerebral differences between Man and 

 the Apes are not of more than generic value, his family distinction 

 resting chiefly on his dentition, pelvis and lower limbs. 



The conclusion, then, formed from all these particulars is, that Man 

 differs in structure no more from the higher Apes, than the higher 

 Apes differ from the lower Primates — that this Order leads us " insen- 

 sibly from the crown and summit of the animal creation, down to 

 creatures from which there is but a step, as it seems, to the lowestj, 

 smallest, and least intelligent of the placental Mammalia." 



Pursuing the argument. Prof. Huxley continues — " If man be sepa- 

 rated by no greater structural barrier from the brutes than they are 

 from one another, then it seems to follow that if any process of physi- 

 cal causation can be discovered by which the genera and families of 

 ordinary animals have been produced, that process of causation is 

 amply sufficient to account for the origin of Man. In other words, 

 if it could be shown that the Marmosets, for example, have arisen by 

 gradual modification of the ordinary Platyrhini, or that both Marmo- 

 sets and Platyrhini are modified ramifications of a primitive stock, 

 then there would be no rational ground for doubting that Man might 

 have originated, in the one case, by the gradual modification of a Man- 

 like Ape ; or ia the other case, as a ramification of the same primitive 

 stock as those Apes." 



On first reading Prof. Huxley's views on this important subject, it 

 is really difficult to dispover how far he intends his preliminary argu- 

 ment to carry liira. It will be observed that the conclusion just 



