Transcribed from the 1884 Trubner & Co. edition by David Price, email ccx074@pglaf.org SELECTIONS FROM PREVIOUS WORKS _WITH REMARKS ON MR. G. J. ROMANES'_ "_MENTAL EVOLUTION IN ANIMALS_" AND A PSALM OF MONTREAL BY SAMUEL BUTLER "The course of true science, like that of true love, never did run smooth." PROFESSOR TYNDALL, _Pall Mall Gazette_, Oct 30, 1883. (OP. 7) LONDON TRUBNER & CO., LUDGATE HILL 1884 [_All rights reserved_] Ballantyne Press BALLANTYNE, HANSON AND CO. EDINBURGH AND LONDON PREFACE. I delayed these pages some weeks in order to give Mr. Romanes an opportunity of explaining his statement that Canon Kingsley wrote about instinct and inherited memory in _Nature_, Jan. 18, 1867. {iii} I wrote to the _Athenaeum_ (Jan. 26, 1884) and pointed out that _Nature_ did not begin to appear till nearly three years after the date given by Mr. Romanes, and that there was nothing from Canon Kingsley on the subject of instinct and inherited memory in any number of _Nature_ up to the date of Canon Kingsley's death. I also asked for the correct reference. This Mr. Romanes has not thought it incumbent upon him to give. I am told I ought not to have expected him to give it, inasmuch as it is no longer usual for men of any but the lowest scientific standing to correct their misstatements when they are brought to book. Science is made for Fellows of the Royal Society, and for no one else, not Fellows of the Royal Society for science; and if the having achieved a certain position should still involve being obliged to be as scrupulous and accurate as other people, what is the good of the position? This view of the matter is practical, but I regret that Mr. Romanes should have taken it, for his having done so has prevented my being able to tell the reader what Canon Kingsley said about memory and instinct, and this he might have been glad to know. I suspect, however, that what Canon Kingsley said was after all not very important. If it had been, Mr. Romanes would have probably told us what it was in his own book. I should think it possible that Mr. Romanes--not finding Canon Kingsley's words important enough to be quoted, or even referred to correctly, or never having seen them himself and not knowing exactly what they were, yet being anxious to give every one, and more particularly Canon Kingsley, his due--felt that this was an occasion on which he might fairly take advantage of his position and say at large whatever he was in the humour for saying at the moment.