On the whole, the reasoning employed in this case much resembles that of some of the Alchemists. When they found a few grains of gold in a large mass of ore of some base metal, they took for granted that the whole had been originallone kind of metal; and also, that this one was, not gold, of which part had degenerated into lead, but lead, of which part had ripened into gold; and thence they easily inferred the possibility of transmutation.

Such attempts at refutation as this, serve to show the strength of the position assailed. The position however was one which it was necessary to assail somehow or other, from its being fatal to the attempt made to revive Lamarck's theory of the spontaneous transition of one species into another of a higher character; the lowest animalcules having, it seems, in many generations, ripened into fish, thence into reptiles, beasts, and men. Of the earlier stages of these supposed transmutations I never had occasion to treat; but the view I took of the condition of Savages, "breaks the pitcher" (as the Greek proverb expresses it) "at the very threshold." Supposing the animalcule safely conducted, by a series of bold conjectures, through the several transmutations, till from an Ape it became a Man, there is, as I have shown, an insuperable difficulty in the last step of all, from the Savage to the Civilized-Man.

There is however in truth, a similar difficulty- or rather, impossibility-in every preceding stage. The theory proceeds throughout on unsupported and most improbable conjectures. One, and only one, fact is alleged that is open to the test of experiment; on the reality of which fact therefore the whole theory may be considered as staked. It is asserted that Oats, if kept constantly mown down during the summer, will, the next year, become Rye. And this being the only

instance adduced that is not, confessedly, a mere conjecture, it is consequently the basis-supposing it established — of all the conjectures thrown out. Now I would suggest to some of our Agriculturists to offer a trial of the experiment, proposing to the speculators a wager on its success. If the Oats do become Rye, the conjectures as to other such transmutations will at least be worth listening to: should it prove-as I have no doubt it will a failure, the key-stone of the whole structure will have been taken away.

It may be worth while to add, that I have seen it suggested -apparently as a hasty conjecture that there may perhaps be different Species or Varieties of Mankind; of which some are capable of originating civilization by their own natural powers, while others are only capable of receiving it by instruction. What I wish chiefly to point out, is, that admitting - and it would be a great deal to admit the possibility of ́the supposition, it would leave unsolved the main problem; to produce an instance of Savages who have civilized themselves. None can be found: and the supposed capability of self-civilization, if it has ever existed, seems never to have been called into play.

Of the hypothesis itself, the utmost that can be said is, that it cannot be demonstrated to be impossible. There is not only no proof of it whatever, but all the evidence that the case admits of is on the opposite side.

Great as are the differences in respect of size, color, and outward appearance, in those different Races of Animals (such as dogs and horses of different breeds) which are capable, as we know is the case with the human Races of free intermixture, there is no case, I think, of so great and essential a difference in these, as there would be between the supposed two varieties of Man; the "Self-civilizing," and Man

such as we know to exist. That difference indeed would hardly be less than between Man and Brute. If a good Physiologist were convinced of the existence of two such Races, (whether called Species or Varieties,) one of them, a Being, capable when left, wholly untrained, to the mere spontaneous exercise of his natural endowments, of emerging from the Savage state, so as to acquire, in the course of successive generations, the highest point of civilization, and the other, such as actual experience presents to us, he would, I think, assign to this latter an intermediate place between the selfcivilizing Man and the Orang-outang; and nearly equidistant from each and he would not conceive the possibility of an intermixture of any two of the three Races.

However, allowing the abstract possibility of the conjecture I have been alluding to, the main argument, as I have said, remains untouched. If Man generally, or some particular Race, be capable of "self-civilization," in either case it may be expected that some record, or tradition, or monument, of the actual occurrence of such an event, should be found and all attempts to find any have failed.

See Dr. TAYLOR'S Natural History of Society.

[DDD]. Part I. Chap. ii. § 4. p. 96.

"Witnesses are divided into incompetent, suspicious, (verdachtig,) and sufficient, (vollgultig.) Children under the age of eight years, those who have accepted any reward or promise for their evidence, those who have an immediate and certain interest in the success or failure of the prosecution, those who have been accused of calumny, of giving false informa tion or of perjury, and have been convicted or not fully ac

quitted, and those who, in any material part of their evidence, have been guilty of falsehood or of inconsistency, are all incompetent witnesses. Their evidence is to be rejected in toto. Persons under the age of eighteen, the injured party, informers, (unless officially bound to inform,) accomplices, persons connected with the party for whom they depose, by blood, by marriage, by friendship, by office, or by dependence-persons opposed to the party against whom they depose, by strife or by hatred, those who may obtain by the result of the inquiry any remote or contingent benefit, persons of suspicious character, persons unknown to the court, and those whose manner gives the appearance of insincerity or of partialityare all suspicious witnesses.

"The testimony of two sufficient witnesses, stating not mere inferences, but facts which they have perceived with their own senses, amounts to proof. That of one sufficient witness amounts to half-proof.

"Two suspicious witnesses, whose testimony agrees, are equal to one sufficient witness. Therefore the testimony of two suspicious witnesses agreeing with that of one sufficient witness, or the testimony of four suspicious witnesses by themselves, amounts to proof.

"When the evidence on each side, taken per se, amounts to proof, the decision is to be in favor of the accused. In other cases, contradictory testimonies neutralize one another. So that if there be two sufficient witnesses on one side, and two suspicious witnesses on the other, it is as if there were a single sufficient witness, and consequently a half-proof. But if the number of sufficient witnesses had been three, it would have amounted to proof-the two suspicious witnesses merely neutralizing the evidence of one of the three sufficient witnesses, and therefore still leaving the fact proved. So, the testimony of seven suspicious witnesses, opposed only by

three similar witnesses, amounts to proof-that of six to half-proof. Circumstantial evidence amounts to proof when each fact of which it consists is fully proved, (that is to say, by two sufficient witnesses, or by one such witness and two suspicious ones, or by four suspicious ones,) and when these facts cannot be rationally accounted for on any hypothesis except that of the prisoner's guilt.* If any other explanation is possible, though it may be improbable, or if the facts are imperfectly proved, the circumstantial evidence is imperfect.t The Code does not state with its usual arithmetical preciseness, the gradations in value of imperfect circumstantial evidence. It seems, however, that it may amount to half-proof; for (by Art. 324) if it coalesce with direct evidence amounting to half-proof, the mixture amounts to whole proof. The most complete circumstantial evidence, however, does not authorize the infliction of death.

"Let us see how such rules may work. A man meets two others in a path through a wood. Soon after he has passed and lost sight of them, he hears screams. He turns back and finds one of them lying senseless on the ground, and sees the other running away. He overtakes him, and finds on him the purse and watch of the wounded man, who, by this time, is dead. The murderer and robber, unless he will confess, must escape. In the first place, the evidence is only circumstantial no one saw him give the fatal blow; and secondly, as there is only one witness, there is only a half-proof even of the circumstances to which the witness deposes. We will suppose, however, that the wounded man revives, and deposes that the prisoner demanded his watch and purse, and on his refusal struck him down, and took them. Even then the

* Art. 328.

† Art. 327.

Art. 330.