II. Of Definition—Specific Nature of the Process Alleged.

It is not enough to say generally, this evolution is a process of nature, in origination from a previously existing something. For definition here has to be specific. And in that general sense there are various other evolutionary processes of nature, from which, in order to adequate clearness of science, the process in the present case has to be distinguished. There are the twain evolutions of growth and decay, the generative evolution of individual offspring from parentage, the logical evolution of conclusion from premisses, and the aesthetic imaginative evolution of poetry, from what in the "maker's" mind is "sown a natural body" to be "raised a spiritual body." What, then, is the distinctive in the present case as compared with those other cases. And the answer, doubtless, is—Contribution of real specific difference. This is not merely said by us. It is seen by page 10 science in the nature of the thing. Since the distinctive result in this case is origin of species, the distinctive in process has to be, contribution of specific difference, constituting the new species, making it to be as new and distinct. This, and nothing else. This, or nothing to the purpose—nothing but delusion or baptism of cloud. If there be shown in nature any such thing as contribution of specific difference, then evolutionism is an established theory of origin of species; if not, not.

On behalf of Evolutionism it has been contended that the distinctness in a species, resulting from process of nature, does not, except in degree, amount to more than the distinctness in a variety, producible by directing intervention of man. If that be so, then a species may natively be only a variety that has hardened into stereotype. And correspondingly it may conceivably, without violence to nature, soften back into the variety,—perhaps on its way toward final delinquescence into protoplasm, or dissolution into that slime which the Challenger has found in place of the bathybius of Evolutionary imagination. And so the distinctness in species as in variety will be, not permanent because essential as the form in a statue of bronze, but only complexional and therefore evanescent, like a fading picture on canvas, or dyer's colour in cloth, or discolouration of a flooded river. Here then, when we come to propositions, may rise a question of the reality of species in nature; or, of the reality of nature as specific; and consequently, of the possibility or competency of natural scieice, as distinguished from a mere natural history which, in absence of knowledge of specific natures, can be only a more or less elevated gossip, about illusory surface aspects of a nature that is unreal. But at our present stage of definitions, we need only say that, though species should L e really the same sort of thing as variety, nevertheless a new species has in it something new, distinct from all else in the world; and that this new something, in respect of which the species differs, is of course a specific difference, so far as it goes and so long as it endures. Though it should be superficial and fleeting as the ripple on the lake, the shadow on the hill side, or e'en—

As the rainbow's lovely form
Evanisbing amid the storm,—

still, the origination of it is a contribution of a specific difference, constituting the ne" species, giving it being as new and [unclear: distin] enough. ^*

Notes of criticism of two famous phrases—[unclear: tos] signature—of evolutiouism, "spotaneous generation" and "natural selection." They are [unclear: low] poetical metaphors instead of exact scientific [unclear: de] nitions. They are logically nonsensical; [unclear: rhetorically] effective thus far, that through [unclear: baptia] of cloud they lead into worship of a wilderness [unclear: cal] (1.) "Spontaneous generation." Here the "[unclear: spo] taneons" means that life is originated not from any previous life; while "generation" has no meaning except as implying that the origination [unclear: from] previous life parental. Through [unclear: th] nonsense we land in the view (if view [unclear: may] be called) that to [unclear: i] about prolongation of old chain (say, zinc or copper, is the way to ascertain about origination of new metal (say bronze, by fusion of these). Natural selection" "Natural" here has[unclear: mean], without directing intelligence; for the [unclear: wo] is employed by way of contrast to (" artificial [unclear: sel]) man's intervention of directing [unclear: intel] in the production of new varieties Now "selection" has no meaning except as implying that [unclear: th] is [unclear: di] intelligence operative in the process appearing in the result. The nonsense here [unclear: condu] through cloud to the co fused impression, (l) [unclear: th] the in [unclear: r] nature of the process is affected the absence or presence of directing intelligence the [unclear: ex] occasion of it; or (2), that in [unclear: inqu] ing how in what way or manner nature [unclear: contri] specific difference, we are dealing with the [unclear: tr] or falsehood of evolutionism, that is with the question of fact whether there is [unclear: or] such contribution made by nature anyhow, [unclear: matter] how.

[unclear: D] specialty is that he places the [unclear: cause] specific differentiation in the cosmical condition of the general system of nature around, while other evolutionists place the cause in the previous existing specific nature of individual bodies. [unclear: Th] makes a difference only between two schools [unclear: evolutionism], two moles of evolution It [unclear: pres], [unclear: pos] that evolution, somehow, by process of [unclear: ture], is a fact; while the present [unclear: question] whether in fact there is any such thing as [unclear: n] evolution, causing the origination of specific [unclear: the] world.

The emphasis laid on cosmical condition in the general system of the world around, [unclear: influencing] the development of specific [unclear: s] variant life in detail, may have incidentally enriched natural history by giving an [unclear: imp] toward those observations and [unclear: experiments] tions on nature of which Darwin himself [unclear: w] a master so distinguished. Conjectural by potheses are occasionally thus found useful, [unclear: impulsive] guidance to expiscation of [unclear: fa] even though the facts should be [unclear: des] when [unclear: exp] to explode the hypothes [unclear: is] page 11 a mistaken guess. So Saul, when he went astray in the search for asses, found a kingdom. But it is the asses we now are in search of. And the search for them may be beneficial to our intellectual health in the present relation, if the exercise of dealing away fallacies of ostensible definition serve to deepen and establish in our mind the "clear and distinct idea," of the true nature of the question, which is important in all cases, and very peculiarly and greatly important in the present case.