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THE DESCENT OF MAN AND SELECTION IN RELATION TO SEX By Charles Darwin, M.A., F.R.S. Appleton & Co.: New York: Roman & Co., San Francisco. Vol. 1, 12 mo., pp. 409.

The first volume of this long expected work has at length made it appearance. It is probably destined to excite the most furious scientific controversy of modern times. Mankind will not surrender its descent from Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden without a desperate struggle. Of course in the religious aspect of the question on the power of the Creator would be as signally manifested in the gradual evolution of man from the lowest forms of life as in the special creation which forms the groundwork of our religious belief. But the Darwinian theory necessitates a materialistic plunge so abhorrent that it will never be taken except upon the clearest demonstration.

There is certainly a great charm in the style of argument which Mr. Darwin uses. The candor which he everywhere displays is, if possible, a more potent weapon than his logic. In various places he frankly admits the difficulties which he has to encounter. If a particular problem is too hard for him he has no hesitation in confessing the fact: yet, notwithstanding all the ingenuity which he displays, it is apparent that in the most vital parts of his argument he fails lamentably. Of course, one of the greatest obstacles which he has to face in his demonstration is the fact that the fossil remains of those intermediate forms necessary for the completion of his chain have no where been discovered in any of the stages of evolution which he professes to have discovered. If man be descended from the chimpanzee, where are those intermediate beings which should have existed? Mr. Darwin nowhere pretends that man, in his present form was evolved at once from the quadrumana. It must be admitted that he meets this difficulty with a good deal of ingenuity, but an ingenuity at the same time which is not sufficient to produce conviction. He holds that the place at which man first appeared on the stage of life was not Europe or, in fact, any civilised country, but either Africa or the island of Borneo. Of course neither of these places has yet been geologically explored, and absence of the fossil remains is easily accounted for. But Mr. Darwin might as well have located the final test of his theory in the moon as in the regions indicated. It will be a long time before he can be refuted by actual explorations in them. It is not on the line that Mr. Darwin can be defeated at all. It seems to us, however, that there is another point in his theory which cannot be successfully evaded by a retreat to the most inaccessible parts of the earth.

Mr. Darwin cannot pretend that for ages, the whole of the forces of nature were directed to the production of a single man by the process of evolution. Such an assumption would be fatal to his whole scheme of life. Why then are not chimpanzees now evolving men and women? Why, in short, have evolution come to a standstill? We ought certainly to be able to discover the remains of intermediate forms, if not the forms themselves among contemporary chimpanzees. It may be regarded as hazardous to assail his theory before his book is completed.

Only the first volume is now before us, but in it the whole theory is presented. We have man: then the quadrumana as his immediate ancestors: then the marsupials as the progenitors of them: then the montremata and from them down to the Ascidians, which are a mere pouch with two orifices, without the power of motion, and deriving sustenance from the chance food which may float their way. In truth, Mr. Darwin may be said to have ambushed mankind. Lord Monboddo blurted out his idea that man was descended from the monkey, without preparation of any kind. The world, as a consequence, has not yet ceased laughing at him.

Mr. Darwin went to work in a far shrewder manner. His first work, on the "Origin of Species," was generally received with respect. There was no difficulty in admitting his generalizations about bees, ants, pigeons, dogs, and animals generally. No one, however, who has studied his work carefully could have been deceived as to the place at which he was bound finally to pull up.

The "Descent of Man" is nothing but the sequel to the 'Origin of Species" yet now that we have it in black and white, most people will start back with horror from his conclusions. When he came to generalise on ourselves, a subject with which we are all more or less conversant, an entire revulsion is the natural consequence. If Mr. Darwin had even made out his case, his path in this world would not be one of roses.