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MEN AND APES.

In the second of the two lectures which he recently delivered before the Philosophical Institution here, Professor Huxley declined to acknowledge that those lectures were to be taken as advocating Mr Darwin's theory of the Origin of Species. They were, he said, a mere statement of facts which any man could verify for himself. Was this expected to be taken seriously? Does any one assemble facts without assuming, consciously or unconsciously, principles which regulate the manner in which they are collected? Do scientific lecturers, known to take a particular interest in a given theory, give statements of facts which have no relation to any theory whatever? Is there no such thing as arranging facts so as to make them suggest the theory which they seem to the lecturer to support? Surely this was precisely what Mr Huxley did, and what he had no need to disown. He thinks, he tells us, that Mr Darwin's theory, though not quite made out, is more strongly supported by a number of facts than most persons are disposed to admit. He thinks it has hardly had fair play. He comes down accordingly, and delivers two lectures, in which he arranges his facts, to the best of his ability, in the way that will most strongly exhibit the doctrine which may, he thinks, be the true explanation of them. He accompanies his facts, as he produces them, with a commentary which secures that no one shall escape the question—'What now do these facts suggest?' and that no one shall remain ignorant of the kind of reply which the lecturer is inclined to give. This is just one way of putting a case; the strongest of all ways if well managed, and a perfectly fair one, if the object is sufficiently avowed, and the advocate does not affect an impartiality which he does not feel. Although Mr Huxley objected to his lectures being regarded as advocating Mr Darwin's theory, he did not conceal his own tendencies in that direction. We accuse him therefore not of anything disingenuous, but of squeamishness, in drawing a distinction where there was no difference. And we have made these remarks simply in order to vindicate our own fairness in animadverting farther on the lectures. The truth is, that the question, how far the lectures made a plausible case for Darwin's theory, in one of its applications, is the main question, we had well-nigh said the only one, which has any interest for those who heard the lectures, or for those who discuss them.

Mr Darwin maintains the hypothesis that all species of living things may have been developed by slow degrees and divergencies, under the operation of a principle of "Natural Selection" which he explains, from one or at the most from very few original simple forms. In so far as the application of the principle to man is concerned, it evidently points towards a common origin for him with the higher apes, as his nearest cousins. Mr Huxley's lectures were chiefly occupied with facts which illustrate the physical analogies between man and the animals, and in particular between man and the apes. It is this hypothesis, and this least welcome application of it, which, designedly or undesignedly, the lectures suggest. Now we are to make no ungrounded insinuations as to the views, or the motives either of Mr Darwin or of Professor Huxley. Neither of them, as far as we are aware, has expressed himself adversely to the idea of creative power being concerned, at some point, in the order of the world. Neither of them has denied that there may be an element in man which cannot be accounted for by the hypothesis of transmutation, however fitly that may account for his physical framework. Nor do we maintain that either the creative energy of God, or the immateriality of man is necessarily excluded by their hypothesis, so far as they have developed it. At the same time, it goes in that direction, that is to say it tends to remove difficulties out of the way of those who desire to introduce an atheistic view of the universe, and a materialistic view of man. It is this circumstance which has undoubtedly made the hypothesis so welcome to a number of persons. It is this circumstance, also, which disposes those who are otherwise minded to examine it with particular care. An interest is felt, certainly, on other than scientific grounds, in the question whether nothing beyond natural law is concerned in the production of all species of living things past and present, and whether the origin of man is physically identical with that of every other species, and in particular of the apes. Men ask how does this comport either with Natural or Revealed Religion; and they are quite right in asking the question. As for Mr Darwin and Professor Huxley, however (of whom the one advances hypothesis, and the other without precisely affirming, thinks there is probably a great deal in it), they profess to take their stand simply on the fair construction of ascertained facts. They have been looking, as they tell us, for truth, as Nature presents it to their eyes, and have no wish to go one step beyond her findings. It is quite right that they should ask us to accompany them into this field, and we do not see why anybody should feel the least hesitation in complying.

Although Professor Huxley's "facts" pointed principally to the question about man, we shall make a few remarks in the first place on the more general question as to the Origin of Species. What is the state of that question? And what has Mr Darwin done to throw light upon it? The state of the question is this. Since the beginning of the world it has been apparent to men's eyes that there is a very considerable resemblance among various species of animals. We refer to the animal kingdom alone, for convenience sake. As observation became more minute and scientific, it became clear that analogies the most remarkable and extensive connected together the different species, as types of organised being; so that each holds its place on a system which not merely comprehends but unites all. By-and-bye the facts of geology made men aware that the past had teemed with life, in forms subject to the same analogies, and capable of being ranked in the same system with those which now exist; that these had succeeded one another, some becoming extinct and others appearing; and that, generally speaking, the more highly organised and endowed forms of life appear later in the series. It is this fact of the succession of species on the earth, and the appearance of a certain order (though not rigorously systematic) in the succession, which is the new element supplied by geology to this question of species. Long ago these facts became the starting points for hypothesis. Gould no natural causes be imagined or discovered to explain the origin and succession of species? It appears, on the one hand, that species have become extinct, and have originated, in times of which the rocks preserve the record. It is known, on the other hand, that there is a certain plasticity in organised life. The forms of animals and their instincts do yield somewhat to the presence of altered circumstances, and certain changes may thus be superinduced by various means on the original type. May it not be, then, that species has produced species? May it not be that at some time, under some new influence, the manner and form of life of a given species has altered a little, or even more than a little; and so, by little and little, by one divergence and another, the types have multiplied, and the vast catalogue of species has been filled up? Guesses of this kind were so obvious that they could not fail to occur to speculative men from the dawn of zoological science. But the answer which science, truly so called, gives to them is equally simple and obvious. It is granted that it is not inconceivable that species should produce species, as individual produces individual—like, and yet another. It is conceivable that it might be so; not in the sense of our being able to represent to ourselves how it should be so, but in this sense, that no man can demonstrate, a priori, that such an arrangement is impossible. But the question is one of fact. Is there any evidence of such a thing ever or anywhere taking place, as a new species being physically derived from an old one? After the most heedful examination of all facts adduced, science has answered and answers, No. There are curious facts about the variations observable or producible, especially in domestic animals. But all these, even in the extreme cases, sport within the limits of the specific character proper to each kind, and tend to return from all eccentricities that would obscure that character. There is no such change as estranges the creatures produced from the old kind or constitutes them into a new specific type, and you have only to turn them loose, free from the artificial influences, in order that this may appear undeniably in their progeny. As far as can be judged from all evidence bearing on the question, the species is as true a natural unity, with as strict and incommunicable an identity, as any separate self in the whole range of beings. All attempts to break down this position have failed, simply and entirely failed. Therefore all attempts to account for the origin of species on the assumption that one species can produce, as its progeny, another which will prove diverse from the first, proceed in defiance of all that nature teaches us about species. Proceeding in this way any dream may be propounded. The legitimate object of a hypothesis is to propound a possible cause or mode of origin, conformable to the certain knowledge we already have. This is the rigorous condition of an admissible hypothesis in the case; and this is the reason why all hypotheses of the kind to which we have referred have been generally rejected by scientific men.

Now, the fundamental mistake of Mr Darwin's book was this, that professing to account for the Origin of Species by transmutation, it spent its force entirely away from the main point. In so far as it dwelt upon the similitudes which obtain between the various species of organised beings, it simply added some new illustration of what was perfectly well known before, but nothing that was in the least fitted to alter the balance of argument or evidence on the question. In so far again as it dwelt on the changes which living species may be made to undergo by careful breeding, it still only gave some new illustrations of that which, as to its whole argumentative force, was known before. There was much entertaining detail about pigeons and other impressible creatures. But, after all, it amounted to as much and no more than was patent two thousand years ago to the Roman when he recognised and proceeded on the distinction between the Thessalian and the African horse; or to the Greek, when he bred the Spartan and the Molossian hound. There are variations within the limits of the specific character, but there is no origination of new species. The attempt to produce evidence to establish that there is such a thing, was not only a failure, but we may fairly say a confessed failure. On what, then, was the strength of the work spent? On an endeavour to show that, provided you admit that the species in its natural process of generations is capable of altering into a new species, there are natural causes at work ("natural selection") which would tend to educe the capability into fact, which might sometimes—perhaps often—favour the evolution of the possible change. This is ignoratio elenchi with a vengeance. Why, if the hypothesis be admitted, it will be easy enough to point out or imagine causes that might set changes agoing. It needs no wizard to succeed in making this appear likely; and Mr Darwin succeeds, so pleasantly and so ingeniously, that many an unwary reader imagines that he is proving his theory. All he is proving is, that if you admit the fundamental principle of his theory, it might possibly work in practice. He gets into some serious difficulties even as to this, but it is hardly worth one's while to advert to them. He has done nothing to alter the state of the argument as to the identity and permanence of species, as determined by all the proper evidence upon the point to which we have access. Yet this was the point, the one point, with which he was bound to grapple in advocating an Origin of Species by transmutation. His agreeable but overrated book has therefore left the real question where it found it.

We have dwelt on this, a little too long perhaps, because a precisely similar vice pervades Professor Huxley's manner of assembling and and presenting the "facts," which, he says, we are to verify if we choose. We are, in the judgment of those who heard the lectures, whether the impression which they seem fitted and intended to leave, was not of this kind;—that there is something in the course of recent discovery which tends towards obliterating the old distinctions between man and the lower animals—something which requires us to look on the relations between the two in a new light—something which calls on us to be prepared to see, ere long, "the differences between man and the apes swept away, and their relationship established." Certainly the reports of the lectures, though not verbatim, sufficiently bear out this representation of their tendency. And the something which calls upon us thus to modify our position, is the information which men of science can now give us of the close structural analogy between man and the higher anthropomorphoid apes, especially our ugly friend—the gorilla. Now, we do not dispute that the structural similarities in question were in the main fairly stated by Professor Huxley; though stating them from his own point of view, and under the influence of his own theoretic tendency, he failed we think to estimate soundly the relative value of the resemblances and the diversities. The resemblances are, however, extremely striking, interesting, and worthy to be observed and studied. But yet the plain truth is, (and Professor Huxley, if he would study logic, could not fail to see it), that there is nothing in any or all of them that goes to establish between man and the apes any relationship different from that which everybody has seen, confessed, and accepted, ever since man and ape were first compared as to their physical structure. The argument, if it is meant for an argument, and if it proposes to persuade us to believe anything we did not believe before, is a mere blunder.

From the days of Galen, from the days of Aristotle, from time immemorial, it has been accepted truth that man's physical organisation is analogous to that of the lower animals. Whatever marks he bears of another higher nature combined with the material, whatever dignity is stamped on him as an heir of immortality, the manner of his bodily organisation is animal. Anatomically, chemically, physiologically, the similarity has been constantly assumed, and constantly verified. There is no doubt at all, therefore, in anybody's mind that if you class man according to his physical characters he belongs to the animal kingdom. Neither is there any doubt that of all animals the apes approach him nearest in form. The relationship is therefore already acknowledged. All the vertebrata are so far like him, for he is one of them. All the mammalia are still more like him, for he is one of them. Still more nearly do the quadrumana approach him. This we all knew. What has Mr Huxley found out? That some of these apes approach him a little nearer still. Why, suppose that to-morrow we discover some irrational creature whose physical form, judging from that alone, would rank him even in the same genus with ourselves, does Mr Huxley suppose that this would alter materially the old conditions of relationship? The only point in the matter which any one is concerned either to affirm or deny (except of course in so far as every one is concerned to have the real truth ascertained) is identity of species, inferring a probable or actual common origin. The Professor does not assert anything like this of the gorilla; he hardly expects it, we suppose, in any irrational creature that is to turn up. Then if it be so, all the affinities on which he dwells are simply interesting and instructive facts, illustrating that close connection of ours with the animal kingdom which is admitted on all hands. We are very far from thinking that it is an unimportant matter whether our zoological affinities with the quadrumana are or are not overrated, in such statements of "facts" as Professor Huxley's. We believe that the overstatement of the affinity is unwholesome, and frequently proceeds from unwholesome mental tendencies. If therefore we were considering that question, we should have something to say upon the point. Setting aside all higher criterion, and keeping to what is physical, we should maintain that a very high value ought to be assigned not merely to the diversities of anatomical detail to which Professor Huxley had to advert, but to the readjustment of every portion of the framework, with a view to a new posture and mode of progression, which we find in passing from the apes to man. So thorough and pervading a re-adjustment, the subtle influence of which pervades the whole structure, the true foot, the muscles of the calf and thigh, the relation of the thighbone to the pelvis, the obliquity of the latter, the curvatures of spine, the disposition of the internal organs as to bulk and weight, the position and setting on of the head, with the absence either of ligature or of powerful muscles to hold it up, the arrangement of the carotids, and the like—all these we should assert to constitute a diversity, which fairly demands to be recognised by a very decided chasm in the classification. But when our affinities to the animal kingdom are brought forward as pointing to some new and portentous "relationship," such discussions of detail are out of place, and only obscure the true ground of argument. Since men began to think they have owned that, by the body, they belong to the animal kingdom. The true distinction of man is grounded on his double nature, which really constitutes him into a new kingdom of spiritual and moral being, as distinct from the animal kingdom as that is from any other. As to his bodily connection with the animal kingdom, that being palpable and acknowledged, it really matters nothing at all to the question of man's distinction and superiority, whether certain animals are classified a little nearer him, or a little further off. One naturalist, as Cuvier, may assign man to the separate order of the Bimana, and place him there by himself. Another, as Bury de Saint Vincent, fired we may suppose with sentiments of liberty, equality, and fraternity, and indignant that man should assume to "bear like the Turk, no brother near the throne," may give him for an adlatus the Ourang-outang; straining a point to place among the Bimana that four-handed creature. What does it matter? Suppose that of a number of animals, all more or less like man in structure, some are shown to be a little liker than was supposed, does that alter anything in the state of the argument, or call for any change in the general convictions of men? Man remains a distinct species even in physical character. On a wider view of what his nature includes, he stands divided from all the others by a sovereignty of superior nature, which not the widest range of zoological classification can adequately measure. And it is worth noticing that the apes, which approach in form so nearly, are not so remarkable for animal intelligence as many creatures whose form is less human.

While, therefore, we thank Professor Huxley for his lectures, as turning attention to many interesting facts, we must look upon it as a mere private bewilderment of his own that he regards these as either so surprising or so subversive. If he is to make progress in the direction towards which he has set his face, he must apply himself to break down that principle of the reality and constancy of specific difference, which has hitherto been nibbled at in vain. He will not break it down by any amount of evidence as to the analogies which extend from species to species, with a wonderful order in variety. Nay, in this way he will not even advance his cause one step. All this is but new illustration of an accepted truth, in which the accepted doctrine of species reposes. There would still be some scientific difficulties in the way of establishing any generic relationship between man and the animals, even if the doctrine of the constancy of species were overthrown. There would still remain also all the difficulties arising from revelation. We do not now consider how either class of difficulties bears on the argument. It is enough to say in the meantime that Mr Darwin and Professor Huxley, both alike, mistake the question, and have failed to lay the very foundation of their case.