no facts which can stand criticism. They are,
therefore, doomed to disappear. But the religions which exclude
theology--he mentions Buddhism and Positivism as examples--give no
adequate sanction. Hence, if theology goes, the moral tone of mankind
will be lowered. We shall become fiercer, more brutal, more sensual.
This, he admits, is a painful and even a revolting conclusion, and he
therefore does not care to enlarge upon it. He is in the position of
maintaining that a certain creed is at once necessary to the higher
interests of mankind, and incapable of being established, and he leaves
the matter there.

I may just add, that Fitzjames cared very little for what may be called
the scientific argument. He was indifferent to Darwinism and to theories
of evolution. They might be of historical interest, but did not affect
the main argument. The facts are here; how they came to be here is
altogether a minor question. Oddly enough, I find him expressing this
opinion before the 'Origin of Species' had brought the question to the
front. Reviewing General Jacob's 'Progress of Being' in the 'Saturday
Review 'of May 22, 1858, he remarks that the argument from development
is totally irrelevant. 'What difference can it make,' he asks, 'whether
millions of years ago our ancestors were semi-rational baboons?' This, I
may add, is also the old-fashioned empirical view. Mill, six years
later, speaks of Darwin's speculations, then familiar enough, with equal
indifference. In this, as in other important matters, Fitzjames
substantially adhered to his old views. To many of us on both sides
theories of evolution in one form or other seem to mark the greatest
advance of modern thought, or its most lamentable divergence from the
true line. To Fitzjames such theories seemed to be simply unimportant or
irrelevant to the great questions. Darwin was to his mind an ingenious
person spending immense labour upon the habits of worms, or in
speculating upon what may have happened millions of years ago. What does
it matter? Here we are--face to face with the same facts. Fitzjames, in
fact, agreed, though I fancy unconsciously, with Comte, who condemned
such speculations as 'otiose.' To know what the world was a billion
years ago matters no more than to know what there is on the other side
of the moon, or whether there is oxygen in the remotest of the fixed
stars. He looked with indifference, therefore, upon the application of
such theories to ethical or