Method of Origin of New Species and Structures 411 



hypothetical; and, needless to say; mankind has not yet seen the 

 natural evolution of a species by this process. It has a weakness 

 in the fact that all of its reasoning is on the assumption "other 

 things being equal," whereas in fact the innumerable other things 

 rarely are equal. It has a strength, on the other hand, in the fact 

 that the kind of artificial evolution effected by man in the produc- 

 tion of new kinds of animals and plants, uses precisely and solely 

 the same method of selection and preservation of variations. 

 There is, however, this notable difference between the products 

 of artificial and natural selection, that the former tend always to 

 revert back towards their former condition, while apparently the 

 latter do not; and to many observers this difference seems fatal to 

 any support of natural by artificial evolution. It may be, how- 

 ever, that the time element in the process is important, and that 

 the comparative rapidity with which man makes his new kinds 

 does not allow the new characters enough time to "set." If one 

 keeps a band of rubber stretched only a brief time it springs 

 back to its old shape; if longer, only partly; if long enough, not 

 at all! 



It is difficult for anyone, and impossible for me, to think at 

 much length about Natural Selection without recalling its great 

 author. Science hath her heroes no less than war, and Darwin was 

 one of our noblest. An Englishman, born in 1809 to singular good 

 fortune in material things, and fortunate in the influences which 

 molded his intellectual life, he came slowly to his great concep- 

 tion, which he first published when he was fifty years old. This 

 was in his book The Origin of Species, which by common consent 

 is agreed to have exercised a more profound effect than any 

 other secular book upon human thought. It is difficult for us 

 in these more liberal days to comprehend the bitterness of the 

 opposition which his support of evolution aroused, partly among 

 the older naturalists but chiefly among those who imagined that 

 the foundations of religion were endangered. But through all the 

 storm he stood steadfast, — calm, just, and magnanimous, even 



