CREATION BY LAW. 301 



the fossil insects discovered in the Coal formation of 

 America offer characters intermediate between those of 

 existing orders. Agassiz, again, insists strongly that the 

 more ancient animals resemble the embryonic forms of 

 existing species ; but as the embryos of distinct groups 

 are known to resemble each other more than the adult 

 animals (and in fact to be undistinguishable at a very 

 early age), this is the same as saying that the ancient 

 animals are exactly what, on Darwin's theory, the 

 ancestors of existing animals ought to be ; and this, 

 it must be remembered, is the evidence of one of the 

 strongest opponents of the theory of natural selection. 



Conclusion. 



I have thus endeavoured to meet fairly, and to an- 

 swer plainly, a few of the most common objections to 

 the theory of natural selection, and I have done so in 

 every case by referring to admitted facts and to logical 

 deductions from those facts. 



As an indication and general summary of the line 

 of argument I have adopted, I here give a brief de- 

 monstration in a tabular form of the Origin of Species 

 by means of Natural Selection, referring for the facts 

 to Mr. Darwin's works, and to the pages in this volume, 

 where they are more or less fully treated. 



