No animal of the species can claim the invention. No animal ever introduced any new improvements, or any variation from the former practice. Every one of the species has equal skill from the beginning, without teaching, without experience or habit. Every one has its art by a kind of inspiration. I do not mean that it is inspired with the principles or rules of the art, but with the ability or inclination of working in it to perfection, without any knowledge of its principles, rules, or end.

"The more sagacious animals may be taught to do many things which they do not by instinct. What they are taught to do, they do with more or less skill, according to their sagacity and their training. But in their own arts they need no teaching or training, nor is the art ever improved or lost. Bees gather their honey and their wax, they fabricate their combs and rear their young at this day neither better nor worse than they did when Virgil so sweetly sang their works.

"The work of every animal is indeed like the works of nature, perfect in its kind, and can bear the most critical examination of the mechanic or the mathematician. . . Bees it is well known construct their combs with small cells on both sides fit both for holding their honey and for rearing their young. There are only three possible figures of the cells which can make them all equal and similar, without any useless interstices. These are the equilateral triangle, the square and the regular hexagon. It is well known to

mathematicians that there is not a fourth way possible in which a plane shall be cut into little spaces that shall be equal, similar and regular, without leaving any interstices. Of the three the hexagon is the most proper both for convenience and strength. Bees, as if they knew this, make the cells regular hexagons.1

"As the combs have cells on both sides, the cell may

1 For the amazing economy of the hexagonal cell, see also M. Maeterlinck in The Life of the Bee (tr. by Alfred Sutro), p. 155.

either be exactly opposite, having partition against partition, or the bottom of a cell may rest on the partitions between the cells on the other side, which will serve as a buttress to strengthen it. The last way is best for strength; accordingly the bottom of each cell rests against the point where three partitions meet on the other side, which gives it all the strength possible." So with regard to economy of space and of material and labour, mathematicians have calculated that in the building of their marvellous cells, bees proceed upon the best principles of construction.1

As in

Physiologically, also, a great deal is actually known about animals-e.g. some of the functions of the heart, the lungs, the brain, the veins, the arteries, the blood, etc.; not vaguely known moreover, but in some respects pretty accurately known. Consider, for example, how absolutely the idealist even, is convinced of the necessity of taking an occasional meal to keep his body going-which, of course, renders all his idealistic protestations not merely futile but ridiculous. His theory cannot stand the strain of practice. He has no intention, even, of trying it by practice. morals so in metaphysics, we must simply regard a man whose practices do not agree, and cannot be made to square, with his professions, as crazy or dishonest. This is our answer to all who suppose that they have only to deny an intuition in order to confound the intuitionist-their own conduct immediately gives the lie to their denial. Even the hypothesis of "consistent illusion" which they sometimes try to set up, cannot avail them-that hypothesis being, as we have seen, self-destructive, inasmuch as it necessarily postulates the existence of a real criterion of consistent illusiveness: so that the author and exponents of this hypothesis do indeed, like all other illusionists, only involve themselves in absurdity and ineptitude. They are continually mistaking verbiage and jargon-the merest gibberish, for discourse of Reason.

1 Essays on the Active Powers, iii. pt. i. c. ii., Hamilton's ed.

pp. 545-6.

Much, likewise, is clearly known of the anatomy of animals. Pathologically, also, there is some knowledge to be had, accurate enough to afford a foundation for a science of medicine, both for man and for some of the lower animals.

2. The Known in Botany.—Again, there exists a large body of botanical knowledge. There is a fairly accurate classification of the vegetable kingdom into orders, classes, genera, species, etc., reliable and useful in many ways.

A great deal is known as to the habitat of various members of the vegetable kingdom. It is well known, for example, that the rose does not bloom amid eternal snows, and that the little Alpine flower, the edelweiss, does not flourish in torrid heat. It is well known that the vine does not flourish in northern latitudes, but that it requires a sunny, yet not torrid, climate, in which to justify its existence. All members of the botanic family have probably their favourite soil, temperature and exposure. In favourite circumstances they flourish; in less favourable circumstances they live; in very unfavourable circumstances they sicken and degenerate; in wholly unfavourable circumstances they die. All botanists, probably, will support these statements. Plant an English oak in an English park and it will probably flourish; plant it in the Orkney Islands and it will probably become a mere scrub; plant it in the Sahara Desert and it will speedily be reduced into a mere stick. Ex uno disce omnes. Probably the totality of the members of the Vegetable Kingdom are subject to laws of this

nature.

Historic continuity of Botanical Species. Again, each plant, as each animal, appears to remain constant to its kind. The oak-tree may change its growth and the quality of its timber according to the circumstances of soil, temperature and exposure in which it finds itself planted; but no authentic case can be produced of an oak-tree becoming a fir-tree; nor a fir-tree an oak; nor an ash a willow; nor

a willow an ash. Any kind of tree may become extinct; but no kind of tree, apparently, has ever been seen to change itself into another kind of tree. Thus, speaking of some of the contents of the Danish peat-bogs, Lyell incidentally remarks -The "Scotch fir was afterwards supplanted by the sessile variety of the common oak, of which many prostrate trunks occur in the peat at higher levels than the pines; and still higher the pedunculated variety of the same oak occurs with the elder, birch and hazel. The oak has now in its turn been almost superseded in Denmark by the common beech. Other trees, such as the white birch, characterise the lower part of the bogs and disappear from the higher; while others again like the aspen, occur at all levels and still flourish in Denmark." 1 How any hypothesis of organic evolution can be made to square with such facts, has never yet been explained to me. So with other products of the vegetable kingdom. The gooseberry bush will be found to produce good, medium or inferior gooseberries according to the soil, temperature, exposure and treatment which it receives; but no authentic case can be produced of a gooseberry bush producing plums; nor of a plum-tree producing gooseberries; nor of an apple-tree producing pears; nor of a pear-tree producing apples. (The process of grafting, of course, is not here to be thought of as having any bearing upon the subject.) So the potato may be found to change in its growth and quality according to the physical circumstances in which it is planted and the attention which is bestowed upon its cultivation; but I venture to say that no authentic case can be produced in which the potato has been found to develop itself into a turnip or into anything else than a potato; and so on through the whole vegetable kingdom. In a word, as far as human observation can go, botanical species, like animal species, appear to be, as a matter of historic and visible fact, fixed.

Again something is actually known of the anatomy and 1 Antiquity of Man, p. 9.

physiology of plants; something also, of the diseases and pests to which they are subject, such as mildew, rust, mealybug, Colorado-beetle, greenfly, caterpillar and so forth. Certain remedies, more or less effective, are also known against these pests and diseases. I speak of known facts which each person may verify to his own satisfaction. Positively, all such knowledge may be regarded as positive.

3. The Known in Chemistry. In Chemistry also, mankind are in possession of a great many well-known and useful facts. Up to this date, chemists have been able to make out about seventy elements. Even the idealist or the sceptic of any school would find it wholly unprofitable to call such facts in question even hypothesis of "consistent illusion." 1

on the

Between certain of these elements, chemists have discovered various affinities which lead them to combine in various, constant proportions, resulting in various compounds; and on the other hand, they have discovered various repugnances between different elements which prevent them from so combining. Air, earth, water and everything organic or inorganic, except simple substances, have a chemical composition of some kind; the composition of a large number of them having been to some extent, at least, obtained and tabulated; and their uses to some extent discovered. Sulphuric Acid, for example, is, I understand, a first-rate compound for drains, but eminently bad for breakfast. Even Bishop Berkeley, with his eyes closed, would have admitted this.2

Of these facts there can be no rational doubt; and no man should permit himself to doubt irrationally. Every 1 v. supra, p. 80.

2 That is to say, he would have recognised at a glance that the mere percipi of sulphuric acid could do no harm to his inner man, but that the esse of that fierce liquid taken in sufficient quantity. . . ! At the same time, of course, he would have proceeded to sophisticate about the latter. See, e.g., his Treatise concerning the Principles of Human Knowledge, Works, vol. i. pp. 170-1.