Samuel Butler against the Professionals

Rethinking Lamarckism 1860-1900

David Gillott

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2017
• ISBN:
  9781351550178
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Languages & Linguistics
• Subtopic: Languages
• Index: Languages & Linguistics

In the wake of the 2009 Darwin bicentenary, Samuel Butler (1835-1902) is becoming as well known for his public attack on Darwin's character and the basis of his scientific authority as for his novels Erewhon and The Way of All Flesh. In the first monograph devoted to Butler's ideas for over twenty years, David Gillott offers a much-needed reappraisal of Butler's work and shows how Lamarckian ideas pervaded the whole of Butler's wide-ranging ouevre, and not merely his evolutionary theory. In particular, he argues that Lamarckism was the foundation on which Butler's attempt to undermine professional authority in a variety of disciplines was based. Samuel Butler against the Professionals provides new insight into a fascinating but often misunderstood writer, and on the surprisingly broad application of Lamarckian ideas in the decades following publication of the Origin of Species.

Chapter 1
The Origins of Butler's Lamarckism

In my introduction, I noted Ian Small's assertion that epistemological viewpoints always form the basis of any kind of intellectual authority (Small, pp. 29—30), and how Butler used epistemology as one of the bases of his attack on the professional ideal. In this chapter, after outlining how an early distaste for infant baptism led to his preference for Lamarckism over natural selection, I discuss the role played by analogical reasoning in the discovery of knowledge and thereby as a means by which intellectual authority is both claimed and conferred. In particular, I examine three analogies that Butler would discuss and subvert: Darwin's analogy between artificial and natural selection in the Origin of Species; Paley's analogy between the watchmaker and God in Natural Theology; and Bishop Joseph Butler's analogies between the constitution of nature and natural and revealed religion in the Analogy of Religion. I end the chapter by introducing Samuel Butler's own analogy between the development of tools and the development of limbs, which would form the basis of his Lamarckian thought and which, therefore, had far-reaching consequences across the various disciplines in which he sought to establish his own authority against those professionals — men of science, clergymen, the art establishment, and academics — who held the high ground.

Erasmus Darwin, in the preface to Zoonomia (1794), offered another analogy, albeit less well known than those of his grandson, Bishop Butler, and Paley. Darwin writes:

The great CREATOR of all things has infinitely diversified the works of his hands, but has at the same time stamped a certain similitude on the features of nature, that demonstrates to us, that the whole is one family of one parent. On this similitude is founded all rational analogy; which, so long as it is concerned in comparing the essential properties of bodies, leads us to many and important discoveries; but when with licentious activity it links together objects, otherwise discordant, by some fanciful similitude; it may indeed collect ornaments for wit and poetry, but philosophy and truth recoil from its combinations.¹

Here, Erasmus Darwin is pointing to the difference between true and false analogies: the former 'lead[ing] us to many and important discoveries'; the latter good only 'for wit and poetry'. Although Butler never mentions this warning against the specious use of analogy, it is likely that he was familiar with it, given his copious quotations from Zoonomia in Evolution, Old and New.² Almost two hundred years after Erasmus Darwin, Gillian Beer highlighted a similar dichotomy of the uses to which analogy could be put: as a 'rhetorical trick' at one extreme and as an 'instrument of discovery' at the other (p. 82). That both Darwin's Origin of Specks and Paley's Natural Theology begin with an analogy testifies to its importance whether as a means of discovery or as a rhetorical tool.³

As an 'instrument of discovery', analogy acts as a 'predictive metaphor' (Beer, p. 74). Prediction, or prophecy, is at the heart of both scientific and religious authority. The predictive power of a scientific hypothesis is an index of its strength; in the Old Testament, a prophecy that does not come to pass indicates a false prophet (Deuteronomy 18. 21—22). In Beer's sense, therefore, analogy can be used as a tool to formulate hypotheses, which can then be tested by experiment, potentially resulting in the production of new knowledge and endowing the formulator of the analogy with authority. Famously, however, Thomas Huxley worried publicly that one of the predictions of Darwin's theory of natural selection had never been proved experimentally.⁴ As late as 1893, he wrote that 'until selective breeding is definitely proved to give rise to varieties infertile with one another, the logical foundation of the theory of natural selection is incomplete' (Collected Essays, 11, p. vii). In consequence, the function of Darwin's analogy between artificial and natural selection — as a means of discovery on the one hand, or as a rhetorical tool on the other — has been much debated, most recently by Mark Largent.

Largent asks whether the analogy was as significant in the origination of the theory as Darwin maintained, or whether Darwin only later came to view the analogy as a tool to convince the reader of the reality of natural selection.⁵ He concludes that the development of the theory was an iterative process that took place between Darwin's reading of Malthus in 1838 and the publication of the Origin in 1859 and, therefore, that one should regard with scepticism Darwin's claim that the analogy was instrumental in the origination of the theory. For Largent, the analogy was used as a means by which Darwin could persuade his readers of the truth of his claims (pp. 27—28). In his discussion of the professional ideal, Harold Perkin argues that the professions 'live by persuasion and propaganda' (p. 6). Although the rhetorical use of analogy does not necessarily mean that the analogy has been used speciously, it does allow for this and allows, therefore, for a suspicious reading of an ostensibly neutral scientific text and of Darwin's professional motives.

When Erewhon was published anonymously in 1872, reviewers were divided over the authorial intentions within the well-known 'Book of the Machines' episode. Several of them read it as a clever satire on rhetorical method, by highlighting the absurd or uncomfortable conclusions to which apparently plausible arguments may lead.⁶ However, some of the early reviewers read the episode specifically as a satire or a burlesque of Darwinian evolution. In particular, the negative Athenaeum reviewer asserted that it ^'seem[s] to be an attempt to reduce to the absurd the whole theory of evolution'.⁷ Butler strongly rejected this misreading of his intentions in the preface to the anonymous second edition:

I regret that reviewers have in some cases been inclined to treat the chapters on Machines as an attempt to reduce Mr Darwin's theory to an absurdity. Nothing could be further from my intention, and few things would be more distasteful to me than any attempt to laugh at Mr Darwin; but I must own that I have myself to thank for the misconception, for I felt sure that my intention would be missed, but preferred not to weaken the chapters by explanation, and knew very well that Mr Darwin's theory would take no harm. The only question in my mind was how far I could afford to be misrepresented as laughing at that for which I have the most profound admiration. I am surprised, however, that the book at which such an example of the specious misuse of analogy would seem most naturally levelled should have occurred to no reviewer; neither shall I mention the name of the book here, though I should fancy that the hint given will suffice. (E, pp. 29—30)

Butler had made a similar claim seven years earlier in 'The Mechanical Creation', one of the three articles that formed the germ of the 'Book of the Machines' episode. In this, he is aware that he may be misunderstood and writes that 'the last thing which we should wish to do, would be to throw ridicule on Darwin's magnificent work'.⁸

Peter Mudford has written that the unnamed book referred to in the preface to Erewhon that is the target of the 'specious misuse of analogy' is William Paley's Natural Theology (Ε, p. 263). I shall argue that Paley was indeed one of the targets of Butler's satire, but that he also made more constructive use of Paley's analogy between manmade machines and natural design as the foundation of his Lamarckian evolutionary theory. Instead, as a starting point, I intend to take at face value the assertion Butler made in a letter to Darwin that the target of his satire was actually Bishop Butler's Analogy of Religion. In this letter, written after the publication of Erewhon, Butler explains his authorial intentions behind the 'Book of the Machines' episode:

I have developed and worked out the obviously absurd theory that [machines] are about to supplant the human race and be developed into a higher kind of lite. When I first got hold of the idea, I developed it for mere fun and because it amused me and I thought would amuse others, but without a particle of serious meaning; but I developed it and introduced it into Erewhon with the intention of implying: 'See how easy it is to be plausible, and what absurd propositions can be defended by a little ingenuity and distortion and departure from strictly scientific methods,' and I had Butler's Analogy in my head as the book at which it should be aimed.⁹

To understand why it is plausible to believe this assertion, it is necessary to outline the period in Butler's life just before he left for New Zealand in 1859. This will demonstrate that his epistemology at the time was grounded in personal experience, rather than in an unreflecting belief in traditional authority.

Infant Baptism and Butler's Empiricism

After taking his degree in Classics at St John's College, Cambridge, Butler intended to return and study for ordination. In preparation for this, he worked as a lay assistant at St James's, Piccadilly in London (Jones, Memoir, 1, 60). While there, he discovered that some boys in his parish had not been baptized and realized that it was impossible to distinguish between baptized and unbaptized children merely by observing their behaviour and character (Memoir, 1, 61). A belief in the necessity for infant baptism formed part of the Thirty-Nine Articles to which all Church of England ordinands had to subscribe and Butler's scepticism as to its efficacy thus presented an obstacle to ordination. In a letter to his father, Butler singles out Article x v as the problem:

The passage in the Articles is this: Art. xv. 'But all we the rest, though baptised and born again in Christ, yet offend in many things [...]; and if we say that we have no sin we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us' [...] — Believing for my own part that a man can, by making use of the ordinary means of grace, attain a condition in which he can say, Ί do not offend knowingly in any one thing either habitually or otherwise and believe that whereas once on a time I was full of sin I have now been cleansed from all sin and am Holy even as Christ was holy upon earth.¹⁰

However arcane the issue of infant baptism may appear, Butler's letter to his father suggests broader questions, which I explore more fully in later chapters and introduce here. The concept of original sin held that man was sinful from birth, an innate, hereditary condition resulting from Adam's fall, which necessitated infant baptism as a means of attaining grace. There is therefore a distinction between this unconscious knowledge inherited from Adam and conscious knowledge arising from experience. For Butler, the newly born child cannot knowingly — that is, consciously — offend and therefore should not be consigned to hell if it dies unbaptized. Butler's letter also introduces the complex idea of self-deception. The very phrase implies a multiplicity of selves, one self deceiving the other(s). Butler conceptualized personal identity as a congeries of memories, inherited from all our ancestors and offering conflicting past experiences (see chapter 5). On the face of it, therefore, self-deception should be a universal part of the human condition. However, as discussed in the introduction, Butler viewed it as an egregious vice, associated particularly with professionals.

Infant baptism was topical at the time Butler expressed his own doubts. Some years earlier in the so-called Gorham case, the High Church Bishop of Exeter Henry Philpotts had refused to institute George Gorham to the crown incumbency of Brampford Speke on account of his heterodox views on the matter.¹¹ In an article published in a High Church periodical around the time Butler was engaged in his parish duties in London, the need for infant baptism was asserted in alarmist terms:

For it may be, that as infant baptism is happily with us the rule, we are preserved from those terrible cases of demoniacal possession which undoubtedly prevailed in the earlier ages of the Christian Church. We do not often enough reflect on what or how many evil spirits may be deprived of their power to injure by the reception of that Sacrament.¹²

Butler possessed Samuel Wilberforce's Agathos, and Other Sunday Stories, a very popular collection of religious parables and allegories for children. First published in 1839, it was in its nineteenth edition by 1857.¹³ Butler's observations of his parishioners may have been prompted by a story in this collection, 'The Tent on the Plain — Holy Baptism', a parable about the efficacy of infant baptism. In this story, the narrator observes the behaviour of groups of rural and urban children wearing the 'ring of adoption', a symbol of baptism, and learns that baptism without subsequent faith will not be sufficient to enter the kingdom of Heaven. Moreover, reflecting the fears of the author of the Christian Remembrancer article quoted above, evil spirits are allegorized and are seen by the narrator as preying on the unbaptized or those who have lost their faith.¹⁴

Butler later satirizes baptism in Erewhon. The narrator attempts to convert the savage Chowbok to Christianity and 'explain[s] to him the mysteries of the Trinity and of original sin' (p. 63). He baptizes Chowbok, but worries about its efficacy: On the evening of the same day that I baptized him he tried for the twentieth time to steal the brandy, which made me rather unhappy as to whether I could have baptized him rightly' (p. 64). In contrast, Arowhena, whom the narrator later marries, allows herself to be baptized but retains her Erewhonian religious beliefs rather than subscribing to the Anglican beliefs of the narrator, Her basic goodness, despite her heterodoxy, l...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• Dedication
• Acknowledgements
• Abbreviations
• Introduction
• 1 The Origins of Butler's Lamarckism
• 2 The Attack on Darwin and Professional Science
• 3 The Evolution of Butler's Epistemology
• 4 Anti-Academicism and Lamarckian Aesthetics
• 5 Towards a Posthumous Life
• Conclusion
• Bibliography
• Index