Note 38 — THE GORILLA AND OTHER APES.

The word hypothesis is too often used as though it were synonymous with theory, so that Newton’s famous saying, “Hypotheses non fingo” has come to be regarded by many as though it expressed an objection on Newton’s part against the formation of theories. This would have been strange indeed in the author of the noblest theory yet propounded by man in matters scientific. Newton indicates his meaning plainly enough, in the very paragraph in which the above expression occurs, defining an hypothesis as an opinion not based on phenomena.