74 
proper arena for discussing the value of this most strange and 
startling theory. 
I need not, I am sure, in an audience like the present, define 
the peculiar scientific views which we understand by the term 
Darwinism. In his work on the “ Origin of Species by Natural 
Selection/-’ Mr. Darwin promulgated the theory, which had been 
previously put forth by Lamarck, that all species, instead of 
having been independently created, and possessing an inde- 
pendent existence, had been gradually developed out of other 
forms. In this work he merely hinted at the application of his 
hypothesis to man, but in his recently published work he does 
not hesitate to assert that man, the wonder and glory of the 
universe, has descended from the stem of old world monkeys, 
that he must be classed with the quadrumana, the most imme- 
diate ancestor from which this descent can be traced, being an 
anthropomorphous Ape ! 
This theory abolishes the idea of creation, in the ordinary 
sense of the term. It, at most, concedes to Nature the faculty 
of causing one species to spring from another, and it consequently 
excludes all direct, personal, and miraculous intervention of a 
creating power. 
Here I wish to observe, that, although a decided and most un- 
compromising opponent of Darwinism, I have no a priori objec- 
tion to raise against the theory, and I trust I shall say nothing 
to-night to justify my being classed amongst those whom Mr. 
Darwin describes as “ curiously illustrating the blindness of pre- 
conceived opinion/* or amongst those whom Professor Huxley 
describes as “ contenting themselves with smothering the inves- 
tigating spirit under the feather-bed of respected and respectable 
tradition.** Deprecating all idea of stirring up the odium theo - 
logicum , I consider the doctrine of evolution as a legitimate 
subject for scientific inquiry. I acknowledge, moreover, the 
fairness and perfect honesty with which its author has handled the 
subject, and I recognize also the deep knowledge of natural his- 
tory which the “ Descent of Man ** displays ; and from its 
charm of style and elegance of diction, I am not surprised 
that it has become equally popular in the drawing-room of 
the votary of fashion, as in the study of the naturalist and the 
theologian. 
I should not reject the Darwinian view of the origin of man, 
from any fancied notion that its adoption was derogatory to our 
dignity and inconsistent with man*s position in the order of 
Nature, a notion which was evidently held by the poor deluded 
creature whose suicide was lately recorded in the public papers, 
and upon whose person was found a document, stating that his 
existence was no longer to be tolerated, since Mr. Darwin*s 
