36 THE CAUSE AND THE CAUSER.

than when we started, that two of my learned
brothers are ready to fight for two quite opposite
opinions, and I myself hold a third. The truth
is, facts do not always explain themselves, but
sometimes Jet in just light enough to show us we
are in darkness. . . Yes! I hear your dissen-
tient murmurs at this, but the evidence has been
placed before you—judge for yourselves. We know
now that the moth died from an overcharge of
foreign bodies on its proboscis; that foreign bodies
fall on insects who seek food in orchis flowers,
whenever they hit a particular place in a parti-
cular way, which very often happens; that, pass-
ing thence to other orchis flowers, the foreign body
hits them in another place, thereby scattering dust
upon them, which fertilizes the seeds below ; that
but for this process the orchis race must have died
out with its first flowers, since orchis flowers can-
not dust themselves. And that yet, nevertheless,
neither insect nor flower is conscious of doing any-
thing in the matter; that as far as they are con-
cerned the whole process each time it happens is
an accident. Such are the facts of the case, and,