i8S2.j 
Analyses of Books, 
603 
Another important consideration which Mr. Romanes brings 
forward in his Introduction relates to the “ design question.” 
Not a few persons — even those of high, though not scientific, 
culture — are apt to argue “ the faCt that these innumerable cases 
of adaptation may be accounted for by natural selection is no 
proof that they are not really due to intelligent design.” The 
author justly contends that this objection involves a “ radical 
misconception of the whole logical attitude of Science.” The 
principle called by Sir W. Hamilton the “ law of parsimony ” 
forbids us to seek for higher causes when lower ones are adequate 
to explain the phenomena observed, and this law, as Mr. Romanes 
pointedly observes, is “ the only logical barrier between science 
and superstition.” For if phenomena are to be referred to the 
immediate operation of some supernatural agent, Science be- 
comes impossible. 
Mr. Romanes draws, however, a distinction which is too often 
lost sight of. In rejecting, in our opinion with perfeCt right, the 
teleology of Paley, Chalmers, and the Bridgewater essayists, he 
makes a reservation in favour of a higher form of the theory of 
design. He writes — “ I hold that Mr. Darwin’s theory has no 
point of logical contaCt with the theory of design in the larger 
sense, that behind all secondary causes of a physical kind there 
is a primary cause of a mental kind. Therefore throughout this 
essay I refer to design in the sense understood by the narrower 
forms of teleology, or as an immediate cause of the observed 
phenomena. Whether or not there is an ultimate cause of a 
psychical kind pervading all Nature, a causa causarum which is 
the final raison d'etre of the Cosmos, this is another question, 
which, as I have said, I take to present no point of logical con- 
tact with Mr. Darwin’s theory, or, I may add, with any of the 
methods and results of natural science.” 
The author, having thus cleared the way, goes on to present 
in succession the various kinds of evidence for Organic Evo- 
lution. 
First comes the argument from classification. Here we find 
mention of a “ very comical disquisition in one of Buffon’s 
works on the question as to whether or not a crocodile was to be 
classified as an inseCt ; and the instructive feature in the disqui- 
sition was this, that although a crocodile differs from an inseCt 
as regards every conceivable particular of its internal anatomy, 
no allusion at all is made to this faCt, while the whole discussion 
is made to turn on the hardness of the external casing of a cro- 
codile resembling the hardness of the external casing of a beetle ; 
and when at last Buffon decides that on the whole a crocodile had 
better not be classified as an inseCt : the only reason given is 
that as a crocodile is so very large an animal it would make 
‘ altogether too terrible an inseCt. 7 ” May we not venture to 
suggest that Buffon was here indulging in a sly joke ? 
We can scarcely agree with Mr. Romanes when he remarks, 
2 R a 
