Editorial Comment. 317 
EDITORIAL COMMENT. 
WAS THE DEVELOPMENT THEORY IXFLUEXCED BY THE "VESTI- 
GES OF THE NATURAL HISTORY OF CREATION." 
Concluded . 
Among the important factors of the modern theory of de- 
velopment, the following may he found in this treatise hy 
Robert Chambers ( ?) The analogy of embryology and phy- 
logeny are distinctly enunciated ; the parallel and concomitant 
progress of parent and derived forms are pointed out ; the 
inadmissibility of making horizontal comparisons of the vari- 
ous forms of different classes or sub-kingdoms at any given 
epoch, and on the other hand the necessity of admitting the 
"vertical" connexion of sequent species : the failure of the 
geological record and the consequent futility of the objection 
of missing links ; the effect of changed conditions in giving 
permanency to altered forms of living things (including the 
arrest of development by withdrawal of part of the usual 
forces through which it is eft'ected, illustrated — (p. 174) — 
by the experiment of Milne Edwards with tadpoles, sunk in 
the Seine in • a perforated box, which grew into abnormally 
large tadpoles but did not changei into frogs) — all these are 
stated as clearly as afterwards by Darwin, Huxley. Haeckel 
and many others. 
He only missed the thought of the continually recurring 
accidental modifications becoming persistent through the sur- 
vival of the Attest in the struggle for existence. But this is an 
explanation of the theory rather than the theory itself ; an 
explanation too without which the theory might well be main- 
tained. In this connection it is worthy of mention that the 
cause of this survival suggested by Darwin, and adopted by 
his school, viz. : natural selection, has never received a sup- 
port equal to that accorded to the fact of evolution. Yet be- 
yond a few casual and usually depreciating mentions by the 
great soldiers of the modern development theory this author 
has been entirely neglected. p. f. 
Note. — The foregoing should liave been the closing part of 
"Editorial Comment" in the October number, having been omitted by 
mistake. — Ed. 
