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IPfhvrnfltn* ^I'llvlUJ-lli-v* ?
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pritics are not the legislators , but the judges and police of literature . They do not ux ¦ make laws—ti \ ey interpret and try to enforce them . — Edinburgh Review . ? . ¦ . It is the peculiar misfortune of Science in England that theological prejudices incessantly interfere to determine the current of ideas and obstruct research . Not only has a new idea to fight against its own natural enemies , the old ideas it comes to replace , but it has a still more pugnacious , and more dangerous because unreasoning enemy , in theological prejudice . We waste our breath in attempting to persuade the impetuous Bull that the
scarlet cloak on the hobbling old woman really cannot do him any injury , and that there is no sort of causal relation between the old woman ' s crossing the field and his being molested . Bull , with his large unreason and powerful muscles , closes his eyes , and dashes impetuously in the old lady ' s rear . When Theology sees scarlet it is equally unreasoning . If Galilko ventures on a new astronomical idea , away dashes the Bull ; if Geology attempts to explain the formation of our globe , the valleys are startled with frantic bellowin" ^ of bulls from every parish ; and if an hypothesis put forward as an hypothesis attempt to trace connexion and continuity in the great phenomena of life , not bulls alone , but cows , heifers , rams , goats , all the horned tribe , raise their discordant yells .
In Germany and France the reverse of this is very noticeable . The spirit of theological exclusiveness is active there also ; but the general body of cultivated men , and the men of science , do not so blindly accept its dicta . Science is pursued for its own sake ; it is judged according to its own canons ; its results are not controlled by theology . Christian chemistry and Calvinistic physiology are there unknown . Geology is tested according to the laws it invokes , not according to a theology with which it has nothing to do . Thus , in an excellent article on " Discoveries in Paleontology" in the last Rqvue des Deux Mondes ^ there is a careful statement of the main questions discussed by geologists , and the results of their discussion , but there is no one reference to what the Church thinks on the matter—neither an
apologetic nor an offensive tone is adopted . The writer no more thinks of ' reconciling' Geology and Scripture than even our theologians would now think of reconciling Optics and Scripture . If he seems to favour the Development Hypothesis , he does so purely aa an hypothesis , for which he does not conceive it necessary to apologize ; although he guards against the extravagances of that hypothesis . No one nowadays , he says , maintains that animals are transmuted from one into the other ; but we are forced to admit the hypothesis probable , which , grounded on the subordination of the
invariability of species to that of physical phenomena , assumes that the gradual modification of the surface of the globe has been accompanied by a gradual modification in animal life . The vulgar suppose that the Develop - ment Hypothesis requires them to believe that a cat could be produced from an oyster ; and antagonists are fond of making small merriment with such a conception . It is difficult to suppose that the antagonists believe this to be the meaning of the hypothesis , and we can only rescue their sincerity at the expense of their science : they are either consciously unfair or unconsciously so ignorant as to be uncntitled to a hearing . different
A chemist shows you two wholly dissimilar bodies , with properties . One is beautifully crystalline , the other gaseous . One is a base , the other an acid . They have nothing in common as far as you can detect . Nevertheless the chemist produced the one from the other by means of a third . He will place under your eyes the whole series of products through which the original substance passed , and you will detect how one came from the other ; but you will not , therefore , attempt to convert iron into gold , oxygen into hydrogen , potash into sulphuric acid . Before attempting to prove the Development Hypothesis , much remains to be done in ascertaining the laws of modification gcnerully . It is only since the time of Lamarck that the intimate relation between an Organism and the surrounding
conditions has been suspected ; and we are very far from a satisfactory conception of it . We know that climate Is a great general influence ; but how little we know of its special influences . Let us step out upon the nearest Bhore . The tide is out , leaving exposed the whole of the littoral zone , i . e . between high and low-water marks . The sand , or shingle , or rock throughout this zone is apparently the same ; the water which washes over it when the tide is up is the same ; and yet as we advance towards the sea almost every yard brings us to a now region of life ; weeds and animals which will not grow in one belt are found a few yards lower . Species vary at every step ; and are constant in the same belts . But the curious part of this phenomenon is ,
that all these weeds and animals which show such absolute and rigid localizations on the shore , none found living out of their native zones , will alj flourish in captivity , under circumstances widely different from those of their naturul state . Wo have nt this moment specimens taken from the extreme points of the littoral zono , mostly under the shadow of stones and rocks , under great varieties of depth of water , and always cool as the sea ; they Hvo , now in open shallow pans , exposed to the light of day , the water often getting worm with the sun ' s rays , the depth uniform ; nevertheless , under these and several other differences , they flourish , bring forth , and comport themselves like thoroughly civilized beings . It would bo interesting to sec
in how many generations such changed conditions could continue without producing varieties in the organism . On a large scale , such as Geology deals with , it is clear that organic forms , continue unchanged so long as the physical conditions are unchanged . When Covieb spoke with such triumph of the fact that animals found in the Egyptian tombs were exactly similar to those now , after three thousand years , found in the'same country , he omitted to add the important fact that the country itself had not changed in that interval ; why then should the organic forms have altered ?
M . Lauzel rightly says , that the progress of animal life must not be limited to the progress of one continuous series—a supposed chain of beings —but must be sought in the order of succession of the great classes and their gradual predominance . Every period in the history of our globe is characterized by its special fauna ; amid a vast variety of animals there is one form which belongs peculiarly to the period . Just as in History—the Geology of Humanity—we see nations characterized by a peculiar development , something which specially belongs to them , and which never in sub « - sequent times attains to such perfection . The Roman roads , the Pyramids of Egypt , the architecture and sculpture of Athens , the
splendour of the Moors , the glories of Italian art , are things which cause many to despair of , or deny , the doctrine of human progress ; and if we restrict progress to a linear development these denials are irresistible . But it is with History as with Zoology : particular developments give place to a general development ; the progress in any one line may be imperfect , or null ; but the whole mass of life is raised to a grander power and a higher development . The citizen of London who listens with pleasure to Mr . Cobden , may listen to eloquence less admirable than that which the citizen of Athens heard from Pericles ; but compare the two citizens in knowledge , power , and morality , and the difference between them will be far greater than the difference between Peuicles and Mr . Cobden . We have no more a
Pericles than we have a Trilobite . Our seas are different from those seas on whose tranquil surfaces myriads of convoluted Nautili sported , and in whose depths millions of Lily-stars waved wilfully on their slender stems ; but , as Forbes well continues , other beings not less wonderful have replaced them , while the seas in which they flourished have become lands whereon man in his columned cathedrals and mazy palaces emulates the beauty and symmetry of their fluted stems and chambered shells .
One striking fact is quoted by Mr . Lauzel , in favour of development . It is the fact proclaimed by Agassiz that the embryos and young of all living animals are the image in miniature of the fossil representatives of the same families .- And this fact must not be lost sight of in tracing the development of our globe , which Geology shows to have been gradually emerging from the simplicity and monotony of the first ages into the variety of islands and continents , mountain-chains , plains , valleys , -with accompanying specializations of climate .
We must quit this subject on which we have only touched lightly , to commend an article in the same llevue on Victor Hugo ' s new Poems . It is by Gustave Planche , and is admirable , though a little pedagogic . The article on Peel by Guizot we noticed in our last . Thorney Hall receives the somewhat inexplicable compliment of republication in a reduced form by M . E . Forgues .
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The Montalembert-Croker controversy ia not yet ended ; and when last week , in printing Mr . Murray ' s letter , we expressed our sense of the necessity in such cases of hearing both sideri , we were in little expectation of finding that caution still further confirmed . The following letter from the author of the lleview , addressed to the Alhcnteum , we extract , and add one addressed to ourselves , by the Reviewer , from which , however , we have omitted the concluding sentences , as unnecessarily stepping beyond the facts into personal reflections . Already too much personality has bqen . mixed , up with the matter , and we think the writer of the letter will , on reflection , agree with us that his case rests better upon a statement of facts than on incriminatioiu : - „ We 8 t fl ^
" Mr Murray states in his letter that my charges of wilful omission and suppression in reference to the translation of M . do Montalemberfs work are utterly false , f « , r this good reason : —that the passages suppressed did not exist before the publication of the third edition of that work . Now , I assert that they dui exist in the secopd edition , which wan the one I used in examining the so-called translation . Any one may satisfy himself on this point by referring to pages 173 , 178 , 19 £ , 200 , 201 , 282 , and 283 of the second French edition , which I have left marked at Messrs . Parker and Son ' s , the publishers The chapter of which I more specifically charge the o ^ JS , ^ O'Connell and the House of Lords / is the tenth . % ???¦ £££££ edition . In the so-called English version , Chapter X . is headed « w . Public Schools and the Universities-, ' and the numbers of all the subsequent chapters are . artfUljr altered to cover thin misfeasance . 1 will not utter a word of comment , but . leave the facts to the public , thanking Mr . Murray for having more fully demonstrated a case wl , ich I hud well enough proved in Fruatr ' s MagatiM . I triwt to your Justice to insert these few lines , and remaining yours , &c ., ¦ . _ . UISC . TlIK KjcvjJWBU OK THIS TRANSLATION Olf MONTALKMIMtRT
in ' VuAbBu'H Magazine , « Sir -As in your journal of the 24 th , in a spirit of literary fairness' ( to U 8 C you ? own words * jo » publish Mr . John Murray ' s letter touching the wilful "' PP ™ " !^" S « LL olu £ « ed by me on the translator , or rather miatrans ato .-and P * J « « J Count Montalomberfs work , I presume the Baino » plr » of f « n « vn Undue , you to publit . li my reply , contained in the Athenttum of BaturdaylaHt , the 24 th ln » t .
Ipfhvrnfltn* ^I'Llvluj-Lli-V* ?
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May 31 , 1856 . ] T H jE L B AD E B . 521 "' " -- ----- - ..... _ . _
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), May 31, 1856, page 521, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2143/page/17/
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