What is Darwinism?

_The Opponents of Darwinism._

_The Duke of Argyll._

When cultivated men undertake to refute a certain system, it is to be presumed that they give themselves the trouble to ascertain what that system is. As the advocates of Mr. Darwin"s theory defend and applaud it because it excludes design, and as its opponents make that the main ground of their objection to it, there can be no reasonable doubt as to its real character. The question is, How are the contrivances in nature to be accounted for? One answer is, They are due to the purpose of G.o.d.

Mr. Darwin says, They are due to the gradual and undesigned acc.u.mulation of slight variations. The Duke"s first objection to that doctrine is, that the evidence of design in the organs of plants and animals is so clear that Mr. Darwin himself cannot avoid using teleological language.

"He exhausts," he says, "every form of words and of ill.u.s.tration by which intention or mental purpose can be described. "Contrivance,"

"beautiful contrivance," "curious contrivance," are expressions which occur over and over again. Here is one sentence describing a particular species (of orchids): "The labellum is developed _in order_ to attract the Lepidoptera; and we shall soon see reason for supposing that the nectar is purposely so lodged, that it can be sucked only slowly _in order_ to give time for the curious chemical quality of the matter setting hard and dry.""[31] We have already seen that Mr. Darwin"s answer to this objection is, that it is hard to keep from personifying nature, and that these expressions as used by him mean no more than chemists mean when they speak of affinities, and one element preferring another.

A second objection is, that a variation would not be useful to the individual in which it happens to occur, unless other variations should occur at the right time and in the right order; and that the concurrence of so many accidents as are required to account for the infinite diversity of forms in plants and animals, is altogether inconceivable.

A third objection is, that the variations often have no reference to the organism of the animal itself but to other organisms. "Take one instance," he says, "out of millions. The poison of a deadly snake,--let us for a moment consider what that is. It is a secretion of definite chemical properties with reference not only--not even mainly--to the organism of the animal in which it is developed, but specially to another animal which it is intended to destroy." "How," he asks, "will the law of growth adjust a poison in one animal with such subtle knowledge of the organization of the other, that the deadly virus shall in a few minutes curdle the blood, benumb the nerves, and rush in upon the citadel of life? There is but one explanation: a Mind having minute and perfect knowledge of the structure of both has designed the one to be capable of inflicting death upon the other. This mental purpose and resolve is the one thing which our intelligence perceives with direct and intuitive recognition. The method of creation by which this purpose has been carried into effect is utterly unknown."[32]

A fourth objection has reference to beauty. According to Mr. Darwin, flowers are not intentionally made beautiful, but those which happen to be beautiful attract insects, and by their agency are fertilized and survive. Male birds are not intentionally arrayed in bright colors, but those which happen to be so arrayed are attractive, and thus become the progenitors of their race. Against this explanation the Duke earnestly protests. He refers to the gorgeous adorned cla.s.s of Hummingbirds, of which naturalists enumerate no less than four hundred and thirty different species, distinguished one from the other, in general, only by their plumage. "Now," he asks, "what explanation does the law of natural selection give,--I will not say of the origin, but even of the continuance of such specific varieties as these? None whatever. A crest of topaz is no better in the struggle of existence than a crest of sapphire. A frill ending in spangles of the emerald is no better in the battle of life than a frill ending in spangles of the ruby. A tail is not affected for the purposes of flight, whether its marginal, or its central feathers are decorated with white. It is impossible to bring such varieties into any physical law known to us. It has relation however to a Purpose, which stands in close a.n.a.logy with our knowledge of purpose in the works of men. Mere beauty and mere variety, for their own sake, are objects which we ourselves seek, when we can make the forces of nature subordinate to the attainment of them. There seems to be no conceivable reason why we should doubt or question that these are ends and aims also in the forms given to living organisms, when the facts correspond with this view and with no other."[33]

It will be observed that all these objections have reference to the denial of teleology on the part of Mr. Darwin. If his theory admitted that the organisms in nature were due to a divine purpose, the objections would be void of all meaning.

There is a fifth objection. According to Darwin"s theory organs are formed by the slow acc.u.mulation of unintended variations, which happen to be favorable to the subject of them in the struggle for life. But in many cases these organs, instead of being favorable, are injurious or c.u.mbersome until fully developed. Take the wing of a bird, for example.

In its rudimental state, it is useful neither for swimming, walking, nor flying. Now, as Darwin says it took millions of years to bring the eye to perfection, how long did it take to render a rudimental wing useful?

It is no sufficient answer to say that these rudimental organs might have been suited to the condition in which the animal existed, during the formative process. This is perfectly arbitrary. It has no basis of fact. There are but three kinds of locomotion that we know of: in the water, on the ground, and through the air; for all these purposes a half-formed wing would be an impediment.

The Duke devotes almost a whole chapter of his interesting book to the consideration of "contrivance in the machinery for flight." The conditions to secure regulated movement through the atmosphere are so numerous, so complicated, and so conflicting, that the problem never has been solved by human ingenuity. In the structure of the bird it is solved to perfection. As we are not writing a teleological argument, but only producing evidence that Darwinism excludes teleology, we cannot follow the details which prove that the wing of the gannet or swift is almost as wonderful and beautiful a specimen of contrivance as the eye of the eagle.

FOOTNOTES:

[31] _Reign of Law_. London, 1867, p. 40.

[32] _Reign of Law_. London, 1867, p. 37.

[33] _Reign of Law_, pp. 247, 248.

_Aga.s.siz._

Every one knows that the ill.u.s.trious Aga.s.siz, over whose recent grave the world stands weeping, was from the beginning a p.r.o.nounced and earnest opponent of Mr. Darwin"s theory. He wrote as a naturalist, and therefore his objections are princ.i.p.ally directed against the theory of evolution, which he regarded as not only dest.i.tute of any scientific basis, but as subversive of the best established facts in zoology.

Nevertheless it is evident that his zeal was greatly intensified by his apprehension that a theory which obliterates all evidence of the being of G.o.d from the works of nature, endangered faith in that great doctrine itself. The Rev. Dr. Peabody, in the discourse delivered on the occasion of Professor Aga.s.siz"s funeral, said: "I cannot close this hasty and inadequate, yet fervent and hearty tribute, without recalling to your memory the reverent spirit in which he pursued his scientific labors.

Nearly forty years ago, in his first great work on fossil fishes, in developing principles of cla.s.sification, he wrote in quotations, "An invisible thread in all ages runs through this immense diversity, exhibiting as a general result that there is a continual progress in development ending in man, the four cla.s.ses of vertebrates presenting the intermediate steps, and the invertebrates the constant accessory accompaniment. Have we not here the manifestation of a mind as powerful as prolific? an act of intelligence as sublime as provident? the marks of goodness as infinite as wise? the most palpable demonstration of the existence of a personal G.o.d, author of all this; ruler of the universe, and the dispenser of all good? This at least is what I read in the works of creation." And it was what he ever read, and with profound awe and adoration. To this exalted faith he was inflexibly loyal. The laws of nature were to him the eternal Word of G.o.d.

"His repugnance to Darwinism grew in great part from his apprehension of its atheistical tendency,--an apprehension which I confess I cannot share; for I forget not that these theories, now in the ascendent, are maintained by not a few devout Christian men, and while they appear to me unproved and incapable of demonstration, I could admit them without parting with one iota of my faith in G.o.d and Christ. Yet I cannot but sympathize most strongly with him in the spirit in which he resisted what seemed to him lese-majesty against the sovereign of the universe.

Nor was his a theoretical faith. His whole life, in its broad philanthropy, in its pervading spirit of service, in its fidelity to arduous trusts and duties, and in its simplicity and truthfulness, bespoke one who was consciously fulfilling a mission from G.o.d to his fellow-men."

The words "evolution" and "Darwinism" are so often in this country, but not in Europe, used interchangeably, that it is conceivable that Dr.

Peabody could retain his faith in G.o.d, and yet admit the doctrine of evolution. But it is not conceivable that any man should adopt the main element of Mr. Darwin"s theory, viz., the denial of all final causes, and the a.s.sertion, that since the first creation of matter and life, G.o.d has left the universe to the control of unintelligent physical causes, so that all the phenomena of the plants and animals, all that is in man, and all that has ever happened on the earth, is due to physical force, and yet retain his faith in Christ. On that theory, there have been no supernatural revelation, no miracles; Christ is not risen, and we are yet in our sins. It is not thus that this matter is regarded abroad. The Christians of Germany say that the only alternative these theories leave us, is Heathenism or Christianity; "Heidenthum oder Christenthum, Die Frage der Zeit."

_Janet._

Janet, a professor of philosophy, is the author of a book on the Materialism of Buchner.[34] The greater part of the last chapter of his work is devoted to Darwinism. He says, "Dr. Buchner invoked (Darwin"s book) as a striking confirmation of his doctrine." (p. 154) What Buchner"s doctrine is has been shown on a previous page. The points of coincidence between Darwin"s system and his are, that both regard mind as a mere function of living matter; and both refer all the organs and organisms of living things to the unconscious, unintelligent operation of physical causes. Buchner"s way of accounting for complicated organs was, "that the energy of the elements and forces of matter, which in their fated and accidental occurrence must have produced innumerable forms, which must needs limit each other mutually, and correspond, apparently, the one with the other, as if they were made for that purpose. Out of all those forms, they only have survived which were adapted, in some manner, to the conditions of the medium in which they were placed." (p. 30) This is very clumsy. No wonder Buchner preferred Darwin"s method. The two systems are, indeed, exactly the same, but Mr.

Darwin has a much more winning way of presenting it.

Professor Janet does not seem to have much objection to the doctrine of evolution in itself; it is the denial of teleology that he regards as the fatal element of Mr. Darwin"s theory. "According to us," he says, "the true stumbling-block of Mr. Darwin"s theory, the perilous and slippery point, is the pa.s.sage from artificial to natural selection; it is when he wants to establish that a blind and designless nature has been able to obtain, by the occurrence of circ.u.mstances, the same results which man obtains by thoughtful and well calculated industry."

(p. 174)

Towards the end of his volume he says: "We shall conclude by a general observation. Notwithstanding the numerous objections we have raised against Mr. Darwin"s theory, we do not declare ourselves hostile to a system of which zoologists are the only competent judges. We are neither for nor against the trans.m.u.tation of species, neither for nor against the principle of natural selection. The only positive conclusion of our debate is this: no principle hitherto known, neither the action of media, nor habit, nor natural selection, can account for organic adaptations without the intervention of the principle of finality.

Natural selection, unguided, submitted to the laws of a pure mechanism, and exclusively determined by accidents, seems to me, under another name, the chance proclaimed by Epicurus, equally barren, equally incomprehensible; on the other hand, natural selection guided beforehand by a provident will, directed towards a precise end by intentional laws, might be the means which nature has selected to pa.s.s from one stage of being to another, from one form to another, to bring to perfection life throughout the universe, and to rise by a continuous process from the monad to man. Now, I ask Mr. Darwin himself, what interest has he in maintaining that natural selection is not guided--not directed? What interest has he in subst.i.tuting accidental causes for every final cause?

I cannot see. Let him admit that in natural, as well as in artificial selection, there may be a choice and direction; his principle immediately becomes much more fruitful than it was before. His hypothesis, then, whilst having the advantage of exempting science from the necessity of introducing the personal and miraculous intervention of G.o.d in the creation of each species, yet would be free from the banishing out of the universe an all-provident thought, and of submitting everything to blind and brute chance." (pp. 198, 199) Professor Janet asks far too much of Mr. Darwin. To ask him to give up his denial of final causes is like asking the Romanists to give up the Pope. That principle is the life and soul of his system.

FOOTNOTE:

[34] _The Materialism of the Present Day: a Critique of Dr. Buchner"s System_. By Paul Janet, Member of the Inst.i.tute of France, Professor of Philosophy at the Paris Faculte des Lettres. Translated from the French, by Gustave Ma.s.son, B. A. London and Paris, 1867.

_M. Flourens._

M. Flourens, recently dead, was one of the earliest and most p.r.o.nounced opponents of Darwinism. He published in 1864 his "Examen du Livre de M.

Darwin sur l"Origine des Especes." His position as Member of the Academie Francaise, and Perpetual Secretary of the Academie des Sciences, or Inst.i.tut de France, vouch for his high rank among the French naturalists. His connection with the Jardin des Plantes gave him enlarged opportunities for biological experiments. The result of his own experience, as well as the experience of other observers, was, as he expresses it, his solemn conviction that species are fixed and not trans.m.u.table. No ingenuity of device could render hybrids fertile. "They never establish an intermediate species." It is, therefore, to the doctrine of evolution his attention is princ.i.p.ally directed.

Nevertheless, he is no less struck by Darwin"s way of excluding all intelligence and design in his manner of speaking of nature. On this point he quotes the language of Cuvier, who says: "Nature has been personified. Living beings have been called the works of nature. The general bearing of these creatures to each other has become the laws of nature. It is thus while considering Nature as a being endowed with intelligence and will, but in its power limited and secondary, that it may be said that she watches incessantly over the maintenance of her work; that she does nothing in vain, and always acts by the most simple means.... It is easy to see how puerile are those who give nature a species of individual existence distinct from the Creator, and from the law which He has impressed upon the movements and peculiarities of the forms given by Him to living things, and which He makes to act upon their bodies with a peculiar force and reason." Older writers, says Flourens, in speaking of Nature, "gave to her inclinations, intentions, and views, and horrors (of a vacuum), and sports," etc. He says that one of the princ.i.p.al objects of his book is to show how Mr. Darwin "has deluded himself, and perhaps others, by a constant abuse of figurative language." "He plays with Nature as he pleases, and makes her do whatsoever he wishes." When we remember that Mr. Darwin defines Nature to be the aggregate of physical forces, we see how, in attributing everything to Nature, he effectually excludes the supernatural.

In his volume of "Lay Sermons, Reviews," etc., Professor Huxley has a very severe critique on M. Flourens"s book. He says little, however, in reference to teleology, except in one paragraph, in which we read: "M.

Flourens cannot imagine an unconscious selection; it is for him a contradiction in terms." Huxley"s answer is, "The winds and waves of the Bay of Biscay have not much consciousness, and yet they have with great care "selected," from an infinity of ma.s.ses of silex, all grains of sand below a certain size and have heaped them by themselves over a great area.... A frosty night selects the hardy plants in a plantation from among the tender ones as effectually as if the intelligence of the gardener had been operative in cutting the weaker ones down."[35] If this means anything, it means that as the winds and waves of the Bay of Biscay can make heaps of sand, so similar unconscious agencies can, if you only give them time enough, make an elephant or a man; for this is what Mr. Darwin says natural selection has done.

FOOTNOTE:

[35] _Lay Sermons_, p. 347.

_Rev. Walter Mitch.e.l.l, M. A., Vice-President of the Victoria Inst.i.tute._

The Victoria Inst.i.tute, or Philosophical Society of Great Britain, under the presidency of the Earl of Shaftesbury, includes among its members many of the dignitaries of the Church of England, and a large number of distinguished men of different professions and denominations. Its princ.i.p.al object is, "To investigate fully and impartially the most important questions of philosophy and science, but more especially those that bear on the great truths revealed in Holy Scripture, with the view of defending these truths against the opposition of Science, falsely so called." The Inst.i.tute holds bi-monthly meetings, at which papers are read on some important topic, and then submitted to criticism and discussion. These papers, many of which are very elaborate, are published in the Transactions of the Inst.i.tute, together with a full report of the discussions to which they gave rise. Six volumes, replete with valuable and varied information, have already been published.

Very considerable lat.i.tude of opinion is allowed. Hence we find in the Transactions, papers for and against evolution,--for and against Darwinism. It would be easy to quote extracts, pertinent to our subject, more than enough to fill a volume much larger than the present. We must content ourselves with a few citations from the discussion on a paper in favor of the credibility of Darwinism,[36] and another in favor of the doctrine of evolution.[37] In summing up the debates on these two topics, the chairman, Rev. Walter Mitch.e.l.l, presented with great clearness and force his reasons for regarding Darwinism as incredible and impossible. In his protracted remarks he contrasts the Scriptural doctrine, that of the Vestiges of Creation, and that of Darwin on the origin of species. He thus states the doctrine of the Bible on the subject: "If," he says, "science be another name for real knowledge; if science be the pursuit of sound wisdom; if science be the pursuit of truth itself; I say that man has no right to reject anything that is true because it savors of G.o.d. Well, what is this hypothesis--older than that of Darwin--which does, and does alone, account for all the observed facts, or all that which we can read, recorded in the book of Nature? It is, that G.o.d created all things very good; that He made every vegetable after its own kind; that He made every animal after its own kind; that He allowed certain laws of variation, but that He has ordained strict, though invisible and invincible barriers, which prevent that variation from running riot, and which includes it within strict and well defined limits. This is a hypothesis which will account for all that we have learnt from the works of Nature. It admits an intelligent Being as the Author of all the works of creation, animate as well as inanimate; it leaves no mysteries in the animate world unaccounted for. There is one thing which the animate, as well as the inanimate world declares to man, one thing everywhere plainly recorded, if we will only read it, and that is the impress of design, the design of infinite wisdom. Any theory which comes in with an attempt to ignore design as manifested in G.o.d"s creation, is a theory, I say, which attempts to dethrone G.o.d. This the theory of Darwin does endeavor to do. If asked how our old theory accounts for such uniformity of design in the midst of such perplexing variety as we find in nature, we reply, that this can only be accounted for on one admission, that the whole is the work of one Author, built according, as it were, to one style; that it represents the unity of one mind with the infinite power of adapting all its works in the most perfect manner for the uses for which they were created." "Whewell has boldly maintained, and he has never been controverted, that all real advances in the sciences of physiology and comparative anatomy,--such as that made by Harvey in discovering the circulation of the blood,--have been made by those who not only believed in the existence of design everywhere manifested in the animate world, but were led by that belief to make their discoveries."

When discussing the paper of Mr. Henslow on evolution, he says: "In speaking of this paper I must commend the exceeding reverent tone in which the author has discussed the subject, and I should like to see all such subjects discussed in a similar tone. The view which Mr. Henslow brings forward, however, does not appear to be a very original one. It was the first view ever brought forward on the doctrine of evolution, and I was the first one to point out that the whole doctrine was one of retrograde character. The whole tone and character of this paper, except that which relates to the attributes and moral government of G.o.d,[38] is nothing more or less than the same view of the doctrine of evolution which created such a sensation in this country when that famous book came out, "The Vestiges of Creation." So far as I can understand the arguments of Mr. Darwin, they have simply been an endeavor to eject out of the idea of evolution the personal work of the Deity. His whole endeavor has been to push the Creator farther and farther back out of view. The most laborious part of Darwin"s attempt at reasoning,--for it is not true reasoning,--the most laborious part of his logic and reasoning, is intended to eliminate, as perfectly as any of the atheistical authors have endeavored to do, the idea of design. Now, setting revelation aside, the manner in which the unknown author of the "Vestiges of Creation" treated this subject, satisfactorily showed that the doctrine of evolution was not in itself an atheistical doctrine, nor did it deny the existence of design. So far as I could understand and make out, having carefully read the book at the time it came out and afterwards, and having carefully a.n.a.lyzed and compared it and Mr.

Darwin"s book with each other, so far as I could understand it, the doctrine of the author of the "Vestiges of Creation" was simply, that G.o.d created all things, and that when He created matter He impressed on it certain laws; that matter, being evolved according to those laws, should produce beings and organs mutually adapted to one another and to the world; and that every successive development which should be produced was essentially foreseen, foreknown, and predetermined by the Deity. His idea, for instance, of the evolution of an eye from a more simple organ was that the ultimate eye--man"s eye, for instance--was to be a perfect optical instrument, and that its perfection depended on the previous design by the Creator, that at a certain period it should appear in a body quite adapted for its purposes. There is one question,--and not the only one, but we must consider it as an important question,--whether you can maintain a doctrine of evolution which shall not be atheistical, and which shall admit the great argument of design?

That is one thing; but the next thing is, does such a doctrine as that accord either with revelation or with the facts of science? I do not believe that it can be made to agree with what we believe to be the revealed Word of G.o.d, and I do not believe that it has in the least degree been proved that the doctrine is consistent with sound science."

As to Mr. Darwin"s theory, it is obvious from the pa.s.sages already quoted that he considers its characteristic feature is not evolution, nor even natural selection, but the denial of teleology, or of intelligent control. Mr. Darwin admits the original creation of one or a few forms of life; and Mr. Mitch.e.l.l, in his comments on Mr. Warington"s defence of his theory, asks, "Why am I to limit the work of the Creator to the simultaneous or successive creations of ten or twelve commencements of the animate creation? Why, simply for the purpose of evading the evidence of design as manifested in the adaptation of all the organs of every animate creature to its wants, which can only be done by so incredible an hypothesis as that of Mr. Darwin. I say fearlessly, that any hypothesis which requires us to admit that the formation of such complex organs as the eye, the ear, the heart, the brain, with all their marvellous structures and mechanical adaptations to the wants of the creatures possessing them, so perfectly in harmony, too, with the laws of inorganic matter, affords no evidence of design; that such structures could be built up by gradual chance improvements, perpetuated by the law of transmission, and perfected by the destruction of creatures less favorably endowed, is so incredible, that I marvel to find any thinking man capable of adopting it for a single moment." It is useless to multiply quotations. Darwinism is never brought up either formally or incidentally, that its exclusion of design in the formation of living organisms is not urged as the main objection against the whole theory.

FOOTNOTES:

[36] _The Credibility of Darwinism_. By George Warington, Esq., F. C.

S., M. V. I.

[37] _On certain a.n.a.logies between the Methods of Deity in Nature and Revelation_. By Rev. G. E. Henslow, M. A., F. L. S., M. V. I.

[38] The second part of Mr. Henslow"s paper concerns "the methods of the Deity as revealed to us in the Bible." The same is substantially true of his work, _The Theory of Evolution_.