52 Dr. BiJCHNER on Darwinism. [iv. 



an original scientific treatise, but only a lucid expo- 

 sition of the speculations and discoveries of other 

 students of nature. When we have described it as 

 in the main lucid and accurate, we have given it all 

 the praise which as a scientific exposition it can legiti- 

 mately claim to have earned. When we consider it 

 as a contribution to philosophy, when we ask the 

 question whether it can be of any use to us in solving 

 the great problem of our relations to the universe in 

 which we live and move and have our being, we must 

 set down quite another verdict. As an exposition of 

 Darwinism, the work, though by no means all that 

 could be desired, is still an admirable work. But as a 

 vindication of the atheistic and materiahstic way of 

 explaining the universe, it is an utter failure. To 

 suppose that the establishment of the Darwinian 

 theory of man's origin is equivalent to the vindication 

 of materialism and atheism, is a mistake of Dr. Biich- 

 ner' s which would be very absurd were it not so very 

 serious. Mr. Darwin's theory only supposes that a 

 certain aggregate of phenomena now existing has had 

 for its antecedent a certain other and different aggre- 

 gate of phenomena. The entire victory of this theory 

 will only — like the previous victory of Newton's theory 

 over the doctrine of guiding angels, espoused even by 

 Kepler — assure us that in the entire series of pheno- 



