484 LIFE HISTORY STUDIES OF ANIMALS. 



others whicli interests us most deeply, but everything interests us 

 which throws even a faint and reflected light upon human life. Per- 

 haps the professor of zoology is prudent in keeping so close as he does 

 to the facts of structure, and in shunning the very attempt to interpret, 

 but while he wins safety he loses his hold upon our attention. Mor- 

 l^hologyis very well 5 it may be exact; it may prevent or expose serious 

 errors. But morphology is not an end in itself. Like the systems of 

 zoology, or the records of distribution, it draws whatever interest it 

 possesses from that life which creates organs and adaptations. To 

 know more of life is an aim as nearly ultimate and self-explanatory as 

 any purpose that man can entertain. 



Can the study of life be made truly scientific? Is it not too vast, 

 too inaccessible to human faculties? If we venture into this alluring 

 field of inquiry, shall we gain results of permanent value, or shall we 

 bring back nothing better than unverified speculations and curious but 

 unrelated facts? 



The scientific career of Charles Darwin is, I think, a sufflcient answer 

 to such doubts. I do not lay it down as an article of the scientific faith 

 that Darwin's theories are to be taken as true; we shall refute any or 

 all of them as soon. as we know how; but it is a great thing that he 

 raised so many questions which were well worth raising. He set all 

 scientific minds fermenting, and not only zoology and botany, but 

 paleontology, history, and even philology bear some mark of his activity. 

 Whether his main conclusions are in the end received, modified, or 

 rejected, the effect of his work can not be undone. Darwin was a bit 

 of a sportsman and a good deal of a geologist ; he was a fair anatomist 

 and a working systematist; he keenly appreciated the value of exact 

 knowledge of distribution. I hardly know of any aspect of natural 

 history, except synonymy, of which he spoke with contempt. But he 

 chiefly studied animals and plants as living beings. They were to him 

 not so much objects to be stuck through with pins, or pickled, or dried, 

 or labeled, as things to be watched in action. He studied their diffi- 

 culties, and recorded their little triumphs of adaptation with an admir- 

 ing smile. We owe as many discoveries to his sympathy with living 

 nature as to his exactness or his candor, though these too were illus- 

 trious. It is not good to idolize even our greatest men, but we should 

 try to profit by their example. I think that a young student, anxious 

 to be useful but doubtful of his powers, may feel sure that he is not 

 wasting his time if he is collecting or verifying facts which would have 

 helped Darwin. 



Zoologists may justify their favorite studies on the ground that to 

 know the structure and activities of a variety of animals enlarges our 

 sense of the possibilities of life. Surely it must be good for the student 

 of human physiology, to take one specialist as an example of the rest, 

 that he should know of many ways in which the same functions can be 

 discharged. Let him learn that there are animals (starfishes) whose 



