222 DESIGN IN NATURE 



kingdom are automata set in motion and regulated by different parts of the inorganic Idngdom. The most that 

 can be said is that plants and animals derive their substance and part of their force from the inorganic kingdom. 

 Their forms, their structures, their functions, and their activities generally, are inherent and peculiar to themselves. 

 Plants and animals are living things, designed for specific purposes, and constructed to discharge particular offices. 

 While they are influenced up to a point by environment, they are, in no sense, at its mercy. Environment, be 

 it noted, essentially consists of externalities ; conditions of heat and cold, light or its absence, moisture and dryness, 

 state of the earth, the water, and the air, supply of food, crowding, &c. While environment leads to modifications 

 (within limits) of growth and development it does not alter the constitutions of plants and animals, and produce 

 new individuals. I wish to emphasise this point. Plants and animals shghtly modify themselves — or, to be more 

 accurate, are modified by a First Cause — to meet new requirements, but they do not thereby lose their identity. 

 Environment applies all round to certain localities and certain periods. It is more or less a fixed quantity as regards 

 time and space. It is calculated to produce sameness in plants and animals, and certainly would do so if plants 

 and animals were fundamentally alike. It assuredly cannot, of itself, account either for the origin and infinite 

 variety of plants and animals, or the numberless slight modifications which occur in them from time to time. The 

 origin of plants and animals, as well as the modifications and adaptations which characterise them, cannot be 

 referred to it. It is not a chief factor either in the production of plants and animals or in the changes and varia- 

 tions which are known to take place in them. 



If, as Professor Huxley believes, the birds resemble reptiles, and the horses certain ancient mammals, the 

 fact, if fact it be, can only be explained by design and intelKgent adaptation ; and the design and the adapta- 

 tion must be referred either to an intelligent Designer, or to the living things created and controlled by Him. 



Blind, purposeless modification in the principal and subsidiary groups of plants and animals can achieve 

 nothing. The fact that different plants and animals located in a more or less stable environment assume an 

 infinite variety of shapes, and discharge an extraordinary diversity of function, proves to my mind that the main 

 factor in the organic kingdom Hes outside environment. To realise what is here stated one has only to remember 

 that the plants and animals on the surface of the globe are legion as regards size, shape, and function, and that 

 the environment, as explained, is more or less a fixed quantity in different locahties and at different times. If 

 physical pecuUarities and environment were the chief factors in the production and modification of plants and 

 animals, then one would expect to find a certain degree of uniformity which can nowhere be detected. In other 

 words, if the inorganic Idngdom and environment in any one locaUty and at any one period vary Httle, one naturally 

 inquires. Whence come the numberless plant and animal forms found in that locality and at that period ? The 

 great groups and sub-groups of plants and animals, and the individuals composing them, are practically exposed 

 to similar conditions, yet the plant differs from the animal, and both differ infinitely amongst themselves. Plants 

 and animals sometimes appear as mere species of apparently undifferentiated protoplasm, where no traces of 

 structure, in the ordinary sense, can be discovered even with the highest power of the microscope, and sometimes 

 they appear as aggregates of complex tissues, where division of labour is carried to an extreme. The simple and 

 the complex forms occur side by side in the same regions and at the same period of time. 



To put it otherwise, the endless diversities in plants and animals cannot be accounted for by mere inorganic 

 changes, however great and however long continued. 



This is evident from other considerations. The movements of plants and animals, and the presence of sense 

 organs and organs of locomotion, cannot be referred to inorganic changes and environment. Plants and animals 

 move as apart from irritation and external stimulation. The organs of sense and of locomotion were not made 

 by, but to act upon, extraneous substances. The light does not make the eye, the atmosphere the wing, the water 

 the tail of the fish, or the land the hoof of the horse. Neither is the hand, that most marvellous creation, made 

 by externalities and by use and wont. 



There are, as is well known, various kinds of eyes, wings, tails, feet, and hands, but they are, in every instance, 

 intelligently adapted structures. They are fashioned to perform certain functions, and these they discharge 

 unerringly. No better illustration of this can be given than is afforded by the organs of locomotion. Is the 

 surface to be trod hard and unyielding ? Small feet are provided. Is the medium to be traversed yielding and 

 treacherous ? Large feet with webs or a swimming tail are supplied. Is the intensely mobile and extraordinarily 

 light air to be navigated ? Greatiy expanded wings are forthcoming. The expansion of the travelhng surfaces 

 keeps pace with the tenmty, mobihty, and want of supporting power in the media. To this there is no exception 

 Every kind of animal, be it small or great, be it invertebrate or vertebrate, be it animalcule, mollusc, insect, fish^ 

 reptile, bird or mammal, must conform to the inexorable laws of locomotion (see Plates xhx. to liv.). 



Environment cannot account for the small feet of the horse, ox, and deer ; for the enlarged feet of the frog 

 ornithorhynchus, and seal; for the expanded tail of the fish, dolphin, and whale; for the "comparatively very 



