It matters not what part of the organ subserves this function, but it has been supposed that it is ministered to by the fibres of Corti.[[301]] Now it can hardly be contended that the preservation of any race of men in the struggle for life could have depended on such an extreme delicacy and refinement of the internal ear,[[302]]—a perfection only fully exercised in the enjoyment and appreciation of the most exquisite musical performances. Here, surely, we have an instance of an organ preformed, ready beforehand for such action as could never by itself have been the cause of its development,—the action having only been subsequent, not anterior. The Author is not aware what may be the minute structure of the internal ear in the highest apes, but if (as from analogy is probable) it is much as in man, then a fortiori we have an instance of anticipatory development of a most
marked and unmistakable kind. And this is not all. There is no reason to suppose that any animal besides man appreciates musical harmony. It is certain that no other one produces it.
Mr. Wallace also urges objections drawn from the origin of some of man's mental faculties, such as "the capacity to form ideal conceptions of space and time, of eternity and infinity—the capacity for intense artistic feelings of pleasure, in form, colour and composition—and for those abstract notions of form and number which render geometry and arithmetic possible," also from the origin of the moral sense.[[303]]
The validity of these objections is fully conceded by the Author of this book, but he would push it much further, and contend (as has been now repeatedly said), that another law, or other laws, than "Natural Selection" have determined the evolution of all organic forms, and of inorganic forms also. And it must be contended that Mr. Wallace, in order to be quite self-consistent, should arrive at the very same conclusion, inasmuch as he is inclined to trace all phenomena to the action of superhuman WILL. He says:[[304]] "If therefore we have traced one force, however minute, to an origin in our own WILL, while we have no knowledge of any other primary cause of force, it does not seem an improbable conclusion that all force may be will-force; and thus, that the whole universe is not merely dependent on, but actually is, the WILL of higher intelligences, or of one Supreme Intelligence."
If there is really evidence, as Mr. Wallace believes, of the action of an overruling intelligence in the evolution of the "human form divine;" if we may go so far as this, then surely an analogous action may well be traced in the production of the horse, the camel, or the dog, so largely identified with human wants and requirements. And if from other than physical considerations we may believe that such action, though undemonstrable, has been and is; then (reflecting on sensible phenomena
the theistic light derived from psychical facts) we may, in the language of Mr. Wallace, "see indications of that power in facts which, by themselves, would not serve to prove its existence."[[305]]
Mr. Murphy, as has been said before, finds it necessary to accept the wide-spread action of "intelligence" as the agent by which all organic forms have been called forth from the inorganic. But all science tends to unity, and this tendency makes it reasonable to extend to all physical existences a mode of formation which we may have evidence for in any one of them. It therefore makes it reasonable to extend, if possible, the very same agency which we find operating in the field of biology, also to the inorganic world. If on the grounds brought forward the action of intelligence may be affirmed in the production of man's bodily structure, it becomes probable a priori that it may also be predicated of the formative action by which has been produced the animals which minister to him, and all organic life whatsoever. Nay more, it is then congruous to expect analogous action in the development of crystalline and colloidal structures, and in that of all chemical compositions, in geological evolutions, and the formation not only of this earth, but of the solar system and whole sidereal universe.
If such really be the direction in which physical science, philosophically considered, points; if intelligence may thus be seen to preside over the evolution of each system of worlds and the unfolding of every blade of grass—this grand result harmonizes indeed with the teachings of faith that God acts and concurs, in the natural order, with those laws of the material universe which were not only instituted by His will, but are sustained by His concurrence; and we are thus enabled to discern in the natural order, however darkly, the Divine Author of nature—Him in whom "we live, and move, and have our being."
But if this view is accepted, then it is no longer absolutely
necessary to suppose that any action different in kind took place in the production of man's body, from that which took place in the production of the bodies of other animals, and of the whole material universe.