But since that time the course of Darwinian speculation has been greatly influenced by the writings of Weismann, who, among other respects in which he out-darwins Darwin, maintains the doctrine of utility as universal. In consequence of the influence which these writings have exercised, I have been more recently and extensively accused of "heresy" to Darwinian principles, for having stated that "a large proportional number of specific characters" do not admit of being proved useful, or correlated with other characters that are useful. Now, observe, we have here a simple question of fact. We are not at present concerned with the question how far the argument from ignorance may be held to apply in mitigation of such cases; but we are concerned only with the question of fact, as to what proportional number of cases actually occur where we are _unable to suggest_ the use of specific characters, or the useful characters with which these apparently useless ones are correlated. I maintain, as a matter of fact, that the cases in question embrace "a large proportional number of specific characters." On the other hand, I am accused of betraying ignorance of species, and of the work of "species-makers," in advancing this statement; and have been told by Mr. Wallace, and others of his school, that there is absolutely no evidence to be derived from nature in support of my views. Well, in the first place, if this be the case, it is somewhat remarkable that a large body of competent naturalists, such as Bronn, Broca, Nägeli, Kerner, Sachs, De Vries, Focke, Henslow, Haeckel, Kölliker, Eimer, Giard, Pascoe, Mivart, Seebohm, Lloyd Morgan, Dixon, Beddard, Geddes Gulick, and also, as we shall presently see, Darwin himself, should have fallen into the same error. And it is further remarkable that the more a man devotes himself to systematic work in any particular department--whether as an ornithologist, a conchologist, an entomologist, and so forth--the less is he disposed to accept the dogma of specific characters as universally adaptive characters. But, in the second place, and quitting considerations of mere authority, I appeal to the facts of nature themselves; and will now proceed, as briefly as possible, to indicate the result of such an appeal.