THE DESCENT OF MAN.

Cromwell Argus, Volume 2, Issue 83, 13 June 1871, Page 7

THE DESCENT OF MAN.

(From the Australasian, May 27.) The final result of Mr Darwin's labors — the last stage of the theory of development —is readied in those two remarkable volumes, which form the climax and the crown of a speculation perhaps the boldest and grandest in which science was ever engaged. All the world is now informed of what is called the Darwinian theory, and has been prepared for the final announcement which its author had to make, —that man also—man, noble in reason and infinite in faculty ; in form and moving express and admirable ; in action like an angel, in apprehension like a god—man, the " beauty of the world, trae paragon of animals," as Hamlet called him—conforms to the same law of existence as the rest of animated creation, and lias bee'v evolved, like any other member of the family, out of the simpler form into the more complex, through the cycles of years, by the operation of the law of development by natural selection. It was a conclusion which, of course, Mr Darwin could not have resisted,' and of which, indeed, ho has always declared hi 3 full acceptance. He has led us up gradually through his former wovks to the last stage of the creative, or rather the developing, process, which is .nan. ***** * *

The final conclusion to which Mr Darwin has come is that "man is the co-descendant with! other mammals of a common progenitor." Our immediate ancestor, in fact, is declared to be "a hairy quadruped, furnished with a tail and pointed ears, probably arboreal in its habits, and an inhabitant of the Old World." This is not a pedigree very flattering to human pride, and such as the heralds and Mr Disraeli would reject, but after all it is a question of pure science and of nothing else. As Mr Darwin says, we need not be ashamed of such a descent if we regard the matter in the proper ludit. "The most humble organism is something much higher than the inorganic dust under our feet; and no one with an unbiassed mind can study any living creature, however humble, without being struck with enthusiasm at" its marvellous structure and properties." How we arrived from the first rude sketches of life to our present elaborate organisation, physical and moral, and by what steps we ascended, this is what Mr Darwin proposes to show us.

"The most ancient progenitors in the kingdom of the vertebrata at which we are able to obtain an obscure "lance apparently consisted of a group of marine animals, resembling the larva; of existing A.soidians. These animals probably gave rise to a group of fishes, as lowly organised as the Lancelot ; and from these the Ganoids, an I other fishes like the Lepidosiren, must have been developed. From sueli fish a very small aoVince woidl carry ns on to the amphibians. We have seen that birds and reptiles wore once intimately connected together ; and the Monotreinata now, in a slight degree, connects mammals with reptiles. iJut no one can at present say by what line of descent the three higher and rela'ed classes, namely, mammals, birds, and reptiles, were derived from either of the two lower vertebrate classes, namely, amphibians and fishes, fu the class of mammals the stms'are not difficult to conceive which led from the ancient Monotretnata to the ancient marsupials; and from these to the early progenitors of the placental mammals. We may thus ascend to the Lomuridie ; and the interval is not wide from these to the Siraiadte. The Simhdaa then branched off into two great stems, the New World and Old World monkeys ; and from the latter, at a remote period, man, the wonder and glory of the universe, proceeded."

How, from the ancestral Ascidian, we mounted upwards through successive stages to the fish, from the fish to tho amphibian, from the amphibian to the mammal, from the mammal to the perfect monkey, from the monkey to the human savage,—this cannot be shown by positive documents, but it maybe deduced by analogy. The manner of development is through tho law of variation, a law which holds good as well in tho lowest as in the highest forms of life. It is variation which first produces the almost imperceptible differences in individuals, from which individual differences we get to species, from specie:; to orders. The causes of variation are infinite, and dependent upon minute and inappreciable changes of habit, upon the elt'eets of increased use .or disuse of parts, accidental arrests of developments, reversion, correlation, the struggle for existence, and the law of natural selection. The close of this struggle of life, of this process of gradual evolution, is marked by the appearance of homo su/dens on the scene. The improved monkey gradually lost his tail, until it disappeared altogether into tho vertebral column ; then he began to raise himself on his feet, and his hands lost their brute character, and became ht for the throwing of missiles, and tho fashioning of tools. His brain, by exercise of instinct, became larger, instinct grew into intelligence, and intelligence found vent in language. The animal lost his hair by successive intcrbrecdings of the least hairy, and came forth at last in his complete shape, such as we sue in tho Australian black, in the A fricau Bushman, or the Fijian. This is the process which Mr Darwin holds to have taken placojaud in the support of his view ho has colleJcd a vast amount of curious and interesfcij^facts, arranged with great skill, ami told, with )v clearness and simplicity which bonk most charming reading, whether we accept his theory or not. In fact, it is not too much to say of it that no scientific speculation was ever given to tho world in such a fascinating form, with so much wealth

The Descent of Mail," and "Selection in Ldatum to Sex " By Charles Darwin, M.A., ac. Two vols, Loudon : John Murray. 1871.

of philosophic research, with so much courage and modesty. Of course the great difficulty which Mr Darwin has to encounter is to explain the moral superiority of man to his supposed relation'.!, ' This he faces without flinching. He contends that the germs of all human moral feelings are to ])e found in the lower animals. He quotes numerous instances of unselfishness, of heroism, of the highest human virtues, in the brutes. He summarises his reasoning on this point as follows :

"There can be m doubt that the difference between the mind of the lowest man and that of the highest animal is immense. An anthropomorphous ape, if he could take a dispassionate view of his own case, would admit that though he could form an artful plan to plunder a garden —though he could use stones for fighting or breaking nuts, yet that the thought of fashioning a stone into a tool was quite beyond his scope. Still less, as ha would admit, could he follow out a train of metaphysical reasoning, or solve a mathematical problem, or rclleet on God, or admire a grand natural scene. Some apes, however, would probably declare that they could and did admire the beauty of the coloured skin and fur of their partners ia marriage. They would admit, that though they could make other apes understand by cries some of their perceptions and similar wants, the notion of expressing definite ideas by definite sounds had never crossed their minds. They might insist that they were ready to aid their fellow-apes of the same troops in many ways, to risk their lives for them, and to take charge of their orphans ; but they would be forced to acknowledge that disinterested love for all living creatures, the most noble attribute of man, was beyond their comprehension.

" Nevertheless, the difference in mind between man and the higher animals, groat as i: is, is certainly one of degree, and nod oi kind. We have seen that the senses and intentions, the various emotions and faculties—such as love, memory, attention, curiosity, imitation, reason, &e.—of which man boasts, may be found in an incipient, or even sometimes in a well-developed, condition in the lower animals. They are also capable of some inherited improvement, as we see in the domestic dog, compared with the wolf or jackal. If it be maintained that certain powers, such as self-consciousness, abstraction, &c, are peculiar to man, it may well bj th.it these are the incidental results of other highlyadvanced intellectual faculties ; and those again ara mainly the result of the continued use of a highly-developed language. At what age does the new-born infant possess the power of abstraction, or bee une conscious, and reflect on irs existence ? We cannot answer ; nor can wo answer

in regard to the ascending organic scale. The half-art and half-instinct of language still boars the stamp of its gradual evolution, 'J'he ennobling belief in God is not universal with man • anl the belief hi active spiritual agencies naturally follows from his other mental pjwers." The precise method by which the original Ascidian rose into man, Mr Darwin, of course, does not pretend to explain. He can only suggest soma of the ways by which the high ;r forms have boon evolved out of tho lower. It was inevitable that many parts of the process should be inexplicable. Wo cannot toll, for instance, how man should hive come to. be hairless, although his immediate progenitor was hairy. Mr Darwin endeavours to account for it by the operation of the law of " Sexual Selection ;" that is, the law which prompts either the male or female of any animal to choose its partner ; but this explanation is not ipiite satisfactory. Wo can understand how tho anthropoid ape should have come to perceive the advantages of being able to stand on his feet and of using- his hands in other ways than in climbing. Jiut to the original man, as to the perfect ape, it was necessary that his body, in default of clothes, should be covered with hair. The most hairv individuals, we might expect, would be those who would be the fittest to survive tho struggle of life, and to propagate their kind. The law of correlation does noi explain tho difficulty, for although wo can understand that as tho ape began t> walk upright his pelvis became broader and the position of his skull altered, it is not evid.-.'i.. ■>-...: v. ; ; lie became) more man, he lost his hair. Tiiu gradual decay of the tail would of course follow, from tho disuse of that member and its degradation by being sat upon. 'On these and other points, however, it due; not follow that because Mr Darwin can give no sufficient explanation his theory is materially injured. Ho docs not profess to have exhausted ail the processes by which man rose into his present form. He merely propounds a law by which hohas risen, and fortifies his theory by as many illustrations and analogies as it was possible to gather. If lie has persuaded us that man is produced, not by one act of creation but through successive acts, he has accomplished his purpose. As for tho religious objection which has been urged against tho Darwinian theory, our philosopher only condescends tn notice it briefly once, by asking those who denounce his view.; ;is irreligious to show " why it is more irreligious to explain the origin of man as a distinct species by descent from some lower form through tho laws of variation and natural selection, than to explain tho birth of tho individual through the laws of ordinary reproduction 1 The birm both of the species and of the individual are equally parts of that grand sequence of events which our minds refuse to accept as tho results of blind chance. The understanding revolts at such a conclusion, whether or not.we are able to believe that every slight variation of structure, the union of each pair in marriage, tho dissemination of I each seed, and other such ovoiiir., have all been ordained for some special purpo.w."