iges,' had shown us what these men taught, why they taught it,
wherein they were wrong, and how he proposed to set them right, he would
have taken a course at once more agreeable with ordinary practice, and
more likely to clear misconception from his own mind and from those of
his readers.

Mr. Darwin says,[362] "it is easy to hide our ignorance under such
expressions as 'the plan of creation' and 'unity of design.'" Surely,
also, it is easy to hide want of precision of thought, and the absence
of any fundamental difference between his own main conclusion and that
of Dr. Darwin and Lamarck whom he condemns, under the term "natural
selection."

I assure the reader that I find the task of forming a clear,
well-defined conception of Mr. Darwin's meaning, as expressed in his
'Origin of Species,' comparable only to that of one who has to act on
the advice of a lawyer who has obscured the main issue as far as he can,
and whose chief aim has been to make as many loopholes as possible for
himself to escape through in case of his being called to account. Or,
again, to that of one who has to construe an Act of Parliament which was
originally framed so as to throw dust in the eyes of those who would
oppose the measure, and which, having been since found unworkable, has
had clauses repealed and inserted up and down it, till it is in an
inextricable tangle of confusion and contradiction.

As an example of my meaning, I will quote a passage to which I called
attention in 'Life and Habit.' It runs:--

"In the earlier editions of this work I underrated, as now seems
probable, the frequency and importance of modifications due to
spontaneous variability. But it is impossible to attribute to _this
cause_" (i. e. spontaneous variability, which is itself only an
expression for unknown causes) "the innumerable structures which are so
well adapted to the habits of life of each species. I can no more
believe in _this_" (i. e. that the innumerable structures, &c., can be
due to unknown causes) "than that the well adapted form of a racehorse
or greyhound, which, before the principle of selection by man was well
understood, excited so much surprise in the minds of the older
naturalists, can _thus_" (i. e. by attributing them to unknown causes)
"be explained."[363]

This amounts to saying that unknown causes can do so much, but cannot do
so much more. On this passage I wrote, in 'Life and Habit':--

"It is impossible to believe that, after