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letter. And npon the whole, some of them at least prefer 
the wrong utterance of ba, da, ga, instead oi tne original 
pa, ta, la.” But still, “ the best thing the leaders could do 
when their teacher tried to show them their error of tongue- 
force would, no doubt, be done by them. They would screw 
their faces amidst shouts of laughter into the nearest approacn 
they could manage into what was right, but as to correcting 
yesterday's error, once irretrievably made, even if they did so 
themselves it would be too late." Nay, GrimnTs law would 
still prevail, “ and ba, da, ga, would become fa, elm, tha.” “I 
can hardly conceive," in conclusion, says Mr. Heath, “ Grimm s 
law to have arisen except at once, in a day, at a stroke. — - 
“Let some better theory than my own be propounded. At 
present there seems none other which professes to account 
for Grimm's law." 
I think, after hearing this, you will turn with some reliet 
and with fresh zest to Professor Young's paper in our own 
Journal of Transactions, as somewhat more profitable reading. 
But before Professor Young read his paper, we were favoured 
at our opening meeting with an introductory Address by our 
Vice-President and Chairman, upon a graver subject, The Doc- 
trine of Continuity, as enunciated by Mr. Grove, the President 
of the British Association, last year, at Nottingham. This 
was not, however, the first time that Mr. Grove had put for- 
ward the same views, although upon that occasion he 
especially identified them with the theory of Mr. Darwin, 
which he had not done before. The following extract from 
Mr. Grove's well-known work. On the Correlation of Phy- 
sical Forces, will show you to what conclusions the doctrine 
of continuity also leads as regards the universe. Mr. Grove 
says : — * 
« The views of Mr. Thompson differ from those of Laplace recently 
enforced by M. Babinet, which suppose the planets to have been formed by 
a gradual condensation of nebulous matter. A modification of this view 
might, perhaps, be suggested, viz., that worlds or systems, instead of being 
created as wholes at definite periods, are gradually changing by atmospheric 
additions or subtractions, or by accretions or diminutions, arising from nebu- 
lous substance or from meteoric bodies, so that no star or planet could at 
any time be said to be created, or destroyed, or to be in a state of absomte 
stability, but that some may be increasing, others dwindling away, and so 
throughout the universe, in the past as in the future.” (4th ed. p. 104.) 
Here we have the theory of “ the self-evolving powers of 
nature " put plainly forth— the “ doctrine of continuity," 
fully stated. The sum and substance of it confessedly is, 
“that no star or planet could at any time be said to be created ; 
