LAW OP VARIATIONS. 43 



He actually endeavors to make a potent factor out 

 of his own ignorance. For, he appeals to his ignor- 

 ance of any law of variation (therefore, of any law 

 imposing a limit to variation), in justification of his 

 gratuitous assumption of No Limit to Variation. 



We do not wish to be understood, as alleging that 

 Darwin, when he assumes this occult quality, this, mys- 

 terious force which manifests itself in the organism 

 which varies, or this " innate tendency," really affects 

 to explain the phenomena by means of such entity. 

 He confesses (how frankly, we do not know) that this 

 "innate tendency" is the mere symbol of his ignorance 

 of the cause, or law of variation. He stops, for a 

 moment, occasionally to meet the inquiry, of what is 

 the cause of these improvements which arise, and says : 



" We can only attribute them to spontaneous or 

 accidental variability, or as due to chance. This, how- 

 ever, is a supposition wholly incorrect and only serves 

 to indicate plainly our ignorance of the cause of each 

 particular variation." 



Again, he says (p. 195, Origin of Species): 



"Our ignorance of the law of variation is profound." 

 " Not in one case out of a hundred can we pretend to 

 assign any reason why this or that differs, more or less, 

 from the same part in the parent." 



Again, he says (p. 157, Origin of Species'): 



" I have hitherto sometimes spoken as if the varia- 

 tions — so common and multiform in organic beings 

 under domestication, and, in a lesser degree, in those 

 in a state of nature — had been due to chance. This, 

 of course, is a wholly incorrect expression, but it serves 

 to acknowledge plainly our ignorance of the cause of 



