The Daily Astorian. [volume] (Astoria, Or.) 1876-1883, 1882-01-12
Prof. HaeokePs Spontaneous Gen.
GRAFTON.

specific forms by natural selection,
for the present it is well to con.
fine Prof. Haeckel to the first liy.
ing animal, the s'moneron," ssthe
primeval parents of all other or
ganisms," which confessedly did
not and could not originate by
"natural selection," because there
manifestly can be no selection till
there are animal forms from which
to select, and no survival of the
fttest, till animals fit, and unfit
for survival, first exist, and conse-
quently must have either been
created or spontaneously gen.
Grated. The stubborn question
then presents itself to this radical
phase of materialistic philosophy:
is it rational to suppose that an
animal (Moneron) possessing all
the functional organs of life neces-
sary for growing, procreation, nutri
ton, voluntary motion, mental
power, ETC., could have been thus
constructed by the action of pur-
poseless laws and forces, by which
to bring the particles of matter
together in suitable relation
for the exercise of such vital
and mental functions, and the
production Of such vital and men,
tai phenomena? The mere asking
of the question is to emphasize the
answer in the negative. AS well
might we expect the winds of the
desert to drift the sand into
furrows and ridges in such man
ner as to constitute the letters of
the alphabet, and in such order as
to spell out and write the Lords
prayer precisely as recorded in the
book of Mathew. Should Prof.
Haeckel chance to visit a far off
sand plain in some uninhabited re-
gion of the world, and there read
the Lords prayer, or the Declara-
tion of Independence in plain
letters in the sand, where no hu-
man foot prints or other signs were
visible, he would nevertheless in
stantly conclude that some educa-
ted human being had been there
before him. But were that hy-
pothesis absolutely precluded by
circumstances, and should he be
forced to believe that the letters,
words and sentences were really
produced by the action of the
wind in drifting the sand, he would
then as certainly and instantly
conclude that some intelligent
power must have had control of
the wind and giving direction to
its currents by which these intelli-
gent and Ineligible results had
been accomplished. He would not
for one moment think of attribu.
ting this orderly and purposive
arrangement OF the sand particles
into letters, words and sentences
to the operation of the settled
laws of nature, or to the interac-
ton of the physical forces unless
such laws and forces were abso-
lutel Y under the direction of some
intelligent power capable of thus
controlling their action. Notwith-
standing this would he his philo-
sophical conclusion without a mo-
ment's hesitation, yet his living
animal-the moneron, (which con-
talns within its inconceivably COM
plete organism all the organs and
parts, though invisible, needed for
the purposes of nutrition, growth,
reproduction, self division, volun-
tary motion, mental power, etc.,
presents to the mind of this
philosopher no orderly or intelli-
gent arrangements of parts or par
ticles, no adaptation of means to
ends, that might not easily have
resulted from the purposeless
washing of the ocean waves, and
their designless action upon some
chance atom of sedimentary de-
post, two hundred million years
ago. He has no trouble at all in
believing that the blind and will
less laws and forces of nature, with
no intelligent direction whatever,
might have easily organized this
first living animal, which Darwin
declares no unbiased mind can