432 ON THE ORIGIN OF SPECIES 



organ will not be much reduced or rendered rudi- 

 mentary at this early age. The calf, for instance, has 

 inherited teeth, which never cut through the gums of 

 the upper jaw, from an early progenitor having well- 

 developed teeth ; and we may believe, that the teeth 

 in the mature animal were reduced, during successive 

 generations, by disuse or by the tongue and palate 

 having been better fitted by natural selection to browse 

 without their aid ; whereas in the calf, the teeth have 

 been left untouched by selection or disuse, and on the 

 principle of inheritance at corresponding ages have 

 been inherited from a remote period to the present 

 day. On the view of each organic being and each 

 separate organ having been specially created, how 

 utterly inexplicable it is that parts, like the teeth in 

 the embryonic calf or like the shrivelled wings under 

 the soldered wing-covers of some beetles, should thus 

 so frequently bear the plain stamp of inutility ! Nature 

 may be said to have taken pains to reveal, by rudi- 

 mentary organs and by homologous structure, her 

 scheme of modification, which it seems that we wilfully 

 will not understand. 



I have now recapitulated the chief facts and con- 

 siderations which have thoroughly convinced me that 

 species have been modified, during a long course of 

 descent, by the preservation or the natural selection of 

 many successive slight favourable variations. I cannot 

 believe that a false theory would explain, as it seems to 

 me that the theory of natural selection does explain, 

 the several large classes of facts above specified. I see 

 no good reason why the views given in this volume 

 should shock the religious feelings of any one. A 

 celebrated author and divine has written to me that 

 'he has gradually learnt to see that it is just as noble 

 a conception of the Deity to believe that He created 

 a few original forms capable of self-development into 

 other and needful forms, as to believe that He required 

 a fresh act of creation to supply the voids caused by 

 the action of His laws.' 



