The Question at Issue 89 
his reputation is mainly due, have done this. Professor 
Huxley is the man of all others who foisted Mr. Darwin 
most upon us, but in his famous lecture on the coming of 
age of the “‘ Origin of Species ” he did not explain to his 
hearers wherein the Neo-Darwinian theory of evolution 
differed from the old; and why not? Surely, because no 
sooner is this made clear than we perceive that the idea 
underlying the old evolutionists is more in accord with 
instinctive feelings that we have cherished too long to be 
able now to disregard them than the central idea which 
underlies the ‘‘ Origin of Species.” 
What should we think of one who maintained that the 
steam-engine and telescope were not developed mainly 
through design and effort (letting the indisputably existing 
element of luck go without saying), but to the fact that if 
any telescope or steam-engine ‘‘ happened to be made ever 
such a little more conveniently for man’s purposes than 
another,” &c., &c. ? 
Let us suppose a notorious burglar found in possession 
of a jemmy ; it is admitted on all hands that he will use it 
as soon as he gets a chance ; there is no doubt about this ; 
how perverted should we not consider the ingenuity of one 
who tried to persuade us we were wrong in thinking that 
the burglar compassed the possession of the jemmy by 
means involving ideas, however vague in the first instance, 
of applying it to its subsequent function. 
If any one could be found so blind to obvious inferences 
as to accept natural selection, ‘‘ or the preservation of 
favoured machines,’’ as the main means of mechanical 
modification, we might suppose him to argue much as 
follows :—‘‘ I can quite understand,” he would exclaim, 
“how any one who reflects upon the originally simple 
form of the earliest jemmies, and observes the develop- 
ments they have since attained in the hands of our most 
accomplished housebreakers, might at first be tempted to 
believe that the present form of the instrument has been 
