312 DARWIN AND AFTER DARWIN. 



position. The ordinary brain reels under the combined influences 

 of Mr. Romanes' entangled ideas and remarkable language. I make 

 this avowal of imperfect understanding because it has a bearing on 

 this volume. In common with my brother naturalists, I have read 

 Mr. Darwin's and Mr. Wallace's expositions of their views, and 

 without any very powerful effort of the mind I have succeeded in 

 grasping their teaching ; these books were addressed for the most 

 part to naturalists. I have read this exposition by Mr. Romanes 

 of the " Darwinism of Darwin," — written professedly for the general 

 cultivated reader, — and I do not understand it to be the Darwinism 

 of anyone bat Mr. Romanes. I may have unconsciously grown in 

 stupidity ; and to eliminate this personal error have performed the 

 experiment of taking a course of Asa Gray's Darwiniana, and the 

 fine gold has not become dim. I do not wish to press my "vaunted 

 intellect " upon readers, but merely to show an experiment on the 

 literary qualities of this book, and I shall be surprised if I do not 

 find myself in excellent company. 



Let us examine some of the author's methods. At p. 13 we 

 read : — ■" First of all we must clearly recognise that there are only 

 two hypotheses in the field whereby it is possible so much as to 

 suggest an explanation of the origin of species. Either all the 

 species of plants and animals must have been supernaturally 

 created, or else they must have been naturally evolved. There 

 is no third hypothesis possible ; for no one can rationally suggest 

 that species have been eternal." It must be agreed that there are 

 only two main hypotheses in the field, but what is to be said of the 

 position of a man who denies the possibility of a third ? Surely 

 possibilities of hypothesis are infinite. 



That part of the introduction which deals with the argument 

 for evolution apart from the manner of it, — "the evidence of evo- 

 lution as having taken place somehow," apart from "the evidence 

 of the causes which have been concerned in the process," — offered 

 an admirable opportunity for the expounder of Darwinism — a 

 foundation for his structure. It is here that naturalists are in very 

 general agreement, and many of those considered the enemies of 

 evolution by this writer have minds much more open on the subject 

 than he appears to think. ^ But with Mr. Romanes the letter of the 

 injunction is strict, and it must be yea or nay, and whatsoever is 

 less cometh of evil. He lays no such foundation worthy of the 

 flubject, but proceeds to erect his structure on the quagmire known 

 as " antecedent grounds." After a deal of fine writing (which the 

 general public knows well how to skip) about superstition, super- 

 naturalism, "the miraculous," fetishism, &c— which have nothing 

 in the world to do with the argument for evolution, though they 

 certainly inhabit slippery "antecedent grounds "—we are told (p, 17) 

 " to regard it as an a priori truth that nature is everywhere uniform 

 in respect of method or causation : that the reign of law is uni- 

 versal; the principle of continuity ubiquitous. Now it must be 

 obvious to any mind which has adopted this attitude of thought 

 that the scientific theory of natural descent is recommended by an 

 overwhelming weight of antecedent presumption, as against, the 



