theories is to test them by facts, not to erect them into final and absolute standards. We do not imagine that Mr. Curtis will claim that no inquiry into man's descent can be carried on without assuming the existence of an infinite Creator, such as he describes. To such a claim, if made, the immediate and appropriate answer would be, "Solvitur ambulando." Such inquiries are, in point of fact, being conducted every day, without any reference to that particular theory, simply by the aid of such facts and analogies as a study of Nature furnishes. It is quite open, of course, to Mr. Curtis to set such bounds to his own inquiries as he may approve of, and to exercise his originality to the full in devising canons of interpretation for the facts which investigation brings under his notice; but he should really not ask us to accept the special opinions by which he, as an individual, chooses to be guided, as the ultimate and indispensable conditions of all research. "We are quite prepared to arrive at his opinions as the result of inquiry, if the evidence appears to be in their favor, and shall be only too happy to find ourselves in agreement with so potent a logician; but we are not prepared to "postulate" anything that is not absolutely necessary to intellectual movement.
If it should be said that Darwin himself postulated (even in the loosest sense of the word) an infinite Creator, we should meet the statement with a simple denial. Darwin expressed himself on a few occasions in language pointing to a theistic belief; but never so as to imply that the conclusions to which he might be led by a study of Nature were to be checked by general reasonings founded on the nature and attributes of an infinite Creator. One great point of difference—not to mention others—between Darwin and his present critic is that the former was profoundly conscious of his entire inability to speculate intelligently concerning what an infinite Creator might or might not, should or should not, would or would not, have done. Far from being conscious of any such inability, Mr. Curtis seems to entertain no doubt whatever of his perfect competency to discuss and settle questions as to the probable mode or modes of special Divine action. In one place, indeed, he admits that "we can not penetrate into his" (the Almighty's) "counsels without the aid of revelation"; but, on the very same page, he claims to be able to see sufficiently far into the purposes of God to warrant him in believing that "acts of special creation are vastly more probable than the theory of evolution." Throughout the book, indeed, we are continually being called upon to agree with the author that some particular method of action is a much more "probable" one for the Supreme Being to have adopted than some other (evolutionary) process. It does not appear to have ever struck the learned and acute author that such language may savor of impiety even to evolutionists. Where, it may very pertinently be asked, has Mr. Curtis obtained the knowledge that enables him to judge what are the probable methods of Divine action? We
