Darwin and Descent 195 
that great and universal feature in the affinities of all 
organic beings, namely, their subordination in group under 
group. We use the element of descent in classing the indi- 
viduals of both sexes, &c.; . . . we use descent in classing 
acknowledged varieties; ... and I believe this element 
of descent is the hidden bond of connection which natural- 
ists have sought under the term of the natural system ” 
(P. 433). 
Lamarck was of much the same opinion, as I showed in 
“ Evolution Old and New.” He wrote :—“ An arrange- 
ment should be considered systematic, or arbitrary, when 
it does not conform to the genealogical order taken by 
nature in the development of the things arranged, and when, 
by consequence, it is not founded on well-considered 
analogies. There is a natural order in every department of 
nature; it is the order in which. its several component 
items have been successively developed.’”’* The point, 
however, which should more particularly engage our 
attention is that Mr. Darwin in the passage last quoted 
uses “ natural selection”’ and “ descent” as though they 
were convertible terms. 
Again :— 
““Nothing can be more hopeless than to attempt to 
explain this similarity of pattern in members of the same 
class by utility or the doctrine of final causes... . On the 
ordinary view of the independent creation of each being, we 
can only say that soitis.... The explanation 1s mantfest 
on the theory of the natural selection of successive slight 
modifications,” &c. (p. 435). 
This now stands—‘ The explanation is to a large extent 
simple, on the theory of the selection of successive, slight 
modifications.” I do not like ‘a large extent ’’ of sim- 
plicity ; but, waiving this, the point at issue is not whether 
the ordinary course of things ensures a quasi-selection of the 
types that are best adapted to their surroundings, with 
* “ Phil, Zool.,” tom. i., pp. 34, 35- 
