100 ON THE LATEST FORM OF THE DEVELOPMENT THEORY. 
parent throughout the animal and vegetable kingdoms, which has been held to prove 
design, and so to evince the intelligence of the Creative Cause. A theorist who denies 
the necessity of any intervention of such a Cause at any period subsequent to the 
introduction of the first poor germ of life upon the earth is, of course, bound to show 
how these adaptations became so numerous and so perfect; and Natural Selection is 
the very ingenious hypothesis which Mr. Darwin has framed for this purpose. 
The state of the evidence upon each of these five points, and the bearing of each 
upon the main question, may be briefly summed up as follows: — 
1. Individual Variation is the one admitted fact upon which the whole theory rests, 
but which, considered in itself alone, does not aid us at all in the attempt to explain the 
introduction of new races of being. It accounts for the appearance of new individuals. 
2. Inherited Variation is more questionable, the general rule undoubtedly being 
that peculiar and anomalous features — deformities, monstrosities, or lusus nature, 
as they are often termed — are either not transmitted at all by descent, or disappear 
in the course of two or three generations. Whether they disappear because a con- 
genital peculiarity, like an acquired one, such as a scar, a callus, or a stiffened joint, 
not affecting the organs of reproduction, has no tendency to reproduce itself in the 
offspring ; or because the monstrosity is itself a sign or a consequence of some weak- 
ness or defect of constitution, whereby the varying individual is rendered less capable 
than others of continuing its kind; or because the necessary crossing of the altered 
breed with one that is unaltered soon reduces the abnormal growth to nothing; or 
that breeding in and in, which results from the avoidance of crossing, so weakens the 
stock that it soon ceases to be fertile; or whether several of these causes combined 
hasten the work of extinction, — certain itis that Nature makes haste to eliminate these 
departures from type, and to preserve her own.original stamp unchanged. Art may | 
to some extent, and with much painstaking, counteract Nature, laboring to preserve 
and continue the abnormal developments which happen to suit man’s convenience 
or fancy through enforced isolation and regimen, diligent culture, or multiplying or 
changing the food; but the very necessity of adopting these expedients shows the 
tendency of Nature to be the other way, towards the extinction of the forced growth. 
As Mr. Darwin himself remarks, “ sterility is the bane of our horticulture;” and with 
all the care and skill of the most expert breeder of cattle, the progeny of his best 
specimens often disappoint his p and show an unmistakable SEN to 
revert and degenerate. 
-. Of course, it is admitted that nhà are ‘called PRSE he Varieties g Bec ESCH 
with but few precautions, may be made to: breed true; but that these so-called ** Varie- 
