Part 11 (1/2)
Its germination is the springing up of the inner living principle of the grain, not its outer envelope or dead husk. This disappears in decay, except the small nutrient portion within which the germinal principle of life would seem to reside, and which undergoes a thorough chemical change in the process of pa.s.sing from death unto life, or being a.s.similated and taken up into the new living structure. The Apostle's comparison distinctly marks these several changes as the one process of pa.s.sing from death unto life. He saw in this wonderful provision of nature, the still more wonderful prevision of G.o.d. To his mind it was over the debris of the dead past that the living present is constantly marching towards a higher and more perfect life--the ultimate fruition and joy of an eternal home in the skies! And he saw that the two grand instrumentalities and co-accessory agencies to this end, were Life and Death, both equally constant and active, like all the other instrumentalities and governing agencies of the universe. Life is forever unlocking the portals of the present to youth and vigor; Death is forever closing them to age and decrepitude. This divine prevision thus becomes the wisest and most beneficent provision. Without life there would be no such thing as death, and without death no such thing as this grand succession and march of life--this pa.s.sing from out the Shadow into the Day.
Chapter X.
Darwinism Considered from a Vitalistic Stand-Point.
Granting that the a.s.sumption of Darwinism rests, as claimed, on the fixed and inflexible adaptation of means to ends, in the diversified yet measurably specialized processes of nature, there is no logical deduction to be drawn therefrom but that which traces the representatives of all the great types of the animal kingdom to one single source, and that not the Sovereign Intelligence of the Universe, but a mere ”ovule in protoplasm,”
or what may be defined, in its unaggregated form, as an inconceivably small whirligig, having motion on a central axis, but whether an independent motion of its own, or one derived from an Infinite Intelligence, the Darwinian systematizers are not bold enough to aver.
They have too many _a priori_ scruples either to a.s.sert the one proposition or to deny the other. What set this little whirligig in motion is a mystery that lies beyond the purview of science, so called, and into the depths of this infinitessimal and most mysterious little chamber they refuse to go.
They search not for the evidence of an Infinite Intelligence in the outermost circle of the heavens where the highest is to be found, and where a bound is set that we may not pa.s.s, but shutting their eyes to all the grander evidences of such an Intelligence, they dive down into the infinitessimal realm of nature and a.s.sume to dig out the sublimer secrets of the universe there. And this is their grand discovery: That this infinitessimal whirligig of theirs has not only whirled man into existence, but the entire circle of the heavens, with the innumerable host of stars that march therein, and all the boundless systems of worlds that roll in s.p.a.ce. With this subordination of the Infinite to the infinitessimal, of intelligence to insensate matter, of divine energy, so to speak, to blind molecular force, they are satisfied; and, like the mole in the fable, conceive their little molecule to be the only possible creator of a stupendous universe.
Scrutinize my propositions closely, and see if I am guilty of misstating theirs. Their new theory is only a slight modification of an old one, or the old adage, _omne vivum ex ovo_--all life is from an egg. For they a.s.sert that every living thing primordially proceeds from an ovule in protoplasm, the essential part of the protoplasmic egg, so to speak, being this little _ovum_ or cellule, from which have issued all possible organisms in both the vegetable and animal kingdoms. Nor is this theory essentially confined to organic matter. A scientific coArdination of its several known parts, or alleged functions, extends the operations of this infinitessimal whirligig to the plastic or uniformly diffused state of all matter, from which has been evolved, in an infinite duration of past time, not only life in its highest manifestations, but a universe so stupendously grand that no amount of human intelligence can grasp the first conception of it.
Mr. Emerson--our Ralph Waldo--virtually accepts this theory of development, subst.i.tuting, however, a stomach for an ovule, and the reverse of the Darwinian proposition, in what he is pleased to call ”the incessant opposition of nature to everything hurtful.” It is not the ”selection of the fittest” but the ”rejection of the unfit,” by which ”a beneficent necessity (I use his language) is always bringing things right.” ”It is in the stomach of plants,” he says, ”that development begins, and ends in the circles of the universe.” ”'Tis a long way,” he admits, ”from the gorilla to the gentleman--from the gorilla to Plato, Newton, Shakespeare--to the sanct.i.ties of religion, the refinements of legislation, the summits of science, art, poetry.”
Few persons, I take it, will dispute this proposition. The road is a long one and beset with all sorts of thorns and briars, such as Mr. Emerson's philosophy will hardly eradicate from the wayside. Even the most refined empiricism will find it difficult to stomach his stomachic theory of the universe, which lands all atomic or corpuscular philosophy in a digestive sac, such as Jack Falstaff bore about him with its measureless capacity for potations and Eastcheap fare. It is a road too in which Mr. Emerson's philosophy will get many sharp raps from an external world of phenomena, in the futility of both his and the Darwinian hypothesis to explain away the independent origination of certain species of plants and animals--new varieties still springing into existence, under favorable conditions, in obedience to the divine fiat, ”Let the earth bring forth.”
In laying the foundations of this new science, if science it shall be called, we must insist that the course of nature is uniform, and that, however extended our generalizations in any one of her lines of uniformity, all intermediate, as well as ultimate propositions, must not only be stated with the utmost scientific accuracy, but the logical deductions therefrom must also be uniform, or lie in the path of uniformity. The earliest and latest inductions must either coincide or approximate the same end. No links must be broken, no chasms bridged, in the scientific series. There must be a distinct and separate link connecting each preceding and each succeeding one in the chain. The lowest known mammal must be found in immediate relations.h.i.+p with his higher congener or brother, not in any remote cousins.h.i.+p. There must be no saltatory progress--no leaping over intermediate steps or degrees. The heights of science are not to be scaled _per saltum_, except as degrees may sometimes be conferred by our universities.[35]
There are some fish-like animals, say our Darwinian systematizers, like the Lepidosirens and their congeners, with the characteristics of amphibians; and hence they infer that by successive deviations and improvements the lower order has risen into the higher. But out of what page in the volume of nature, in the countless leaves we have turned back, has the immediate congener dropped, that we are obliged to look for the relations.h.i.+p in thirty-fourth cousins? We might as well say that some of the _Infusoria_ possess the same or similar characteristics, and predicate relations.h.i.+p between them and the amphibians; for giants sometimes spring from dwarfs and dwarfs from giants. At all events, our diagnoses must be freed from these intermediate breaks or failures in the chain of continuity, or the doctrine of descent must tumble with the imaginary foundations on which it is built. And bear in mind that the most enthusiastic Darwinist is forced to admit that there are still rigid part.i.tions between the lower and higher organisms that have not been pierced by the light of scientific truth, but they a.s.sume that future discoveries and investigations will solve the difficulty. But science, inflexible as she is, or ought to be, in her demands, admits of no a.s.sumptions, much less sanctions such exceptions and deviations as we constantly find in the Darwinian path of continuity. The eye of imagination can supply nothing to her vision. She is eagle-eyed, and soars into the bright empyrean--does not dive into quagmires and the slime of creation after truth.
But let us see how Mr. Darwin bridges one of the very first chasms he meets with in constructing his chain of generation. He goes back to the first link, or to what he calls primordial generation. Here the leap is from inorganic matter to the lowest form of organic life--from inanimate to animate dust. The chasm is immense, as all will agree. But he bridges it by falling back on his infinitessimal whirligig--his _primum mobile_--or on the motions of elements as yet inaccessible, except to the eye of imagination. For even Plato's monad, or ultimate atom, was not matter itself, being indivisible, but rather a formal unit or primary const.i.tuent of matter, which, like Mr. Darwin's whirligig in its unaggregated form, admits of neither a maximum nor a minimum of comprehension; but rests entirely on imaginary hypothesis. And we may here add that a system which begins in imaginary hypotheses and ends in them--as that of bridging the chasmal difference between a gorilla and a Plato--can be dignified into a science only by a still greater stretch of the imagination--that of bridging the difference between the Darwinian zero and his ninety degrees of development in a Darwin himself!
Bear in mind, as we proceed, that the function of an argument in philosophy, as in logic, is to prove that a certain relation exists between two concepts or objects of thought, when that relation is not self-evident. In the Darwinian chain we have, as the first link, organic life springing from inorganic matter, without the slightest relation existing between the two, except what may be universally predicated of matter itself, whether animate or inanimate, organic or inorganic; and there is no other affirmative premise, expressing their agreement as extremes, that can possibly admit of an affirmative conclusion. The parts are so separated in thought that no metaphysical or ideal distinction exists to coordinate them in cla.s.sification. We are simply forced back, in our attempt at cla.s.sification, upon the intuitions of consciousness, where reason manifestly ceases to enforce its inductions.
And here the human mind intuitively springs an objection which is at once aimed at the very citadel of Darwinism. On what rests the validity of these intuitions except it be that ”breath of life,” which, as we have before said, was breathed into man when he became a living soul? If we follow the divine record, instead of these blind systematizers leading the blind, we shall have no difficulty in establis.h.i.+ng the validity of these intuitions--the highest potential factors this side of Deity to be found anywhere in the universe. For if our intuitions are not to be relied upon--if their objects and perceptions are to be discarded as unreliable--then there can be no agreement or disagreement between any two ideas presented, objectively or subjectively, to the human mind. No processes of mental a.n.a.lysis or ratiocination, like those pursued in the elementary methods of Euclid, can present the basis of an intellectual judgment, or lay the foundation of the slightest faith or belief in the world. To deny the primary perception of truth by intuition is as fatal to ”Evolution” as to the sublimer teachings of the Bible Genesis.
But from the very nature of our being, as well as the primary _datum_ of consciousness itself, we must rest the validity of these intuitions on something, and that, something more than a finite intelligence; and since science, with all her knowledge methodically digested and arranged, furnishes no clue to the mystery, we are left to the higher sources of inspiration to reach it. And this inspiration, however it may be derived, necessarily becomes a part of our intuitions, since it addresses itself to the strongest possible cravings of the human soul, and is accepted as its inseparable companion and guest.
Shall we build our faith then on the Divine Word,--on the Word that was in the beginning with G.o.d, and, when incarnate, _was_ G.o.d,--or on Mr.
Darwin's little whirligig that originally set everything in motion, and has only to go on _ad infinitum_ to whirl us out a G.o.d, as it has already whirled us out a Darwinian universe without one. For if this ovulistic whirligig has bridged the chasmal difference between protoplasm and man, since the transition from inorganic matter to organic life, the process has only to be indefinitely extended to bridge the chasm between man and Deity, or between finite and infinite intelligence. This gives us nature evolving a G.o.d, instead of the doctrine of the old Theogonies, of a G.o.d presiding from all eternity over nature; one ”who laid the foundations of the earth that it should not be removed forever; who stretchest out the heavens like a curtain; who layeth the beams of his chambers in the waters; who maketh his angels spirits; his ministers a flaming fire.”
These evolutionists manifestly get the cart before the horse in their category of cosmological events. It is not inert matter organizing itself into life, nor any mode of physical or chemical action, nor any mere manifestation of motion or of heat, nor any other conceivable correlation of natural forces. None of these has enabled us to penetrate the mysterious _inner-chamber_ of life itself. For reasons obviously connected with our own welfare, He, from whom alone are ”the issues of life,” seems to have ordained that we should fathom the depths of both physical and chemical force, and beneficently wield and direct them to our own uses.
But this vital force; this something that stands apart from and is essentially different from all other kinds of force, is of a nature that baffles all our efforts to approach. The power to grasp it, or even to penetrate in the slightest degree its mysteries, is delegated to none. All attempts to lay bare this principle of vitality, or level the barriers that separate it from physical or chemical action, have utterly failed. We know no more of its essence now than was known a thousand years ago, and know no less than will be known a thousand years hence. To become masters of the mystery, we must enter the impenetrable veil within which the Infinite Intelligence of the universe presides,--who, we are told, ”sendeth forth his spirit, and we are created, who taketh away our breath, we die and return to our dust.” [36]
We are just as much bewildered in respect to this vital principle in our cla.s.sifications of the myriads of little creatures careering over the field of the microscope, as when we turn to the most marked formations of genera and species in geological distribution. The great trouble with Mr.
Darwin's _vinculum_ is, that its weakest links are precisely where the strongest should be found, and _vice versa_. With a candor rarely displayed by a writer who is spinning a theory, he admits this. The geological record is not what he would have it to be. Whole chapters are gone where they are most needed, and nature's lithography seems constantly at fault. Independent species are now and then springing up where derivatives should be looked for, while derivatives are everywhere disappearing in non-derivatives. Many of the middle Tertiary _molusca_, and a large proportion of the later Tertiary period, are specifically identical with the living species, of to-day. What has ”natural selection”
been doing for this family in the last million years or more? Manifestly nothing, and less than nothing, for some of the species have dropped out altogether.
These facts, and hundreds of others like them, are constantly obtruding themselves upon our attention to show, in harmony with the Bible Genesis, the immutability of species--the absolute fixity of types--rather than their variability, as claimed. If nature abhors anything more than a _vacuum_, it is manifestly any marked transition from fixed types, and she thunders her edicts against it in the non-fertility of all hybrids. The doctrine of variation lacks the all-essential element of continuity, and is oftener at war with the theory of the ”selection of the fittest,” than it is with the selection of the ”unfit.” The leap from Lepidosirens to Amphibians is no greater than the interval between any two species of animals or plants yet discovered, either fossil or living. The intervals are as numerous as the species themselves, and everywhere const.i.tute great and sudden leaps, or such transitional changes as ”natural selection”
could not have effected independently of intervening forms--those that nowhere exist in nature, and never have existed, if we are to credit geologic and paleontologic records. There is everywhere similarity of structure, but not ident.i.ty; and the nearer we approach to ident.i.ty of structure the wider the divergence in similarity of characteristics. A bird may be taught to talk and sing s.n.a.t.c.hes of music. But no monkey has ever been able to articulate human sounds, much less give them rhythmical utterance.
Take the case of the wild pigeon, a subject that especially delights Mr.
Darwin. Most of the deviations are confined to the domesticated breeds, and none of these rank in strength, hardiness, capability of flight, or symmetry of structure, with the wild or typical bird. There are well-defined deviations, but no sensible improvements, except to the eye of the bird-fancier. The deviations are simply entailed weaknesses, or the very reverse of what should appear from the ”selection of the fittest.”
The fact undeniably is, that these variations are almost wholly abnormal--mere exaggerated characteristics, induced in the first instance, perhaps, by high cultivation and close in-and-in breeding.
Turn these abnormal varieties loose, let them go back to the aboriginal stock, and these characteristics will rapidly disappear; that is, they will ultimately lose themselves or melt away in the original type. Mr.