26 THE DESCENT OF THE PRIMATES 



That certain newly discovered facts, here re- 

 peatedly alluded to, tend to justify us in some- 

 what loosening the human pedigree from that 

 of the existing monkeys, may perhaps induce 

 more timid minds (the number of which has 

 not been decreasing of late) no longer to shrink 

 from extending the doctrine of evolution to the 

 prehistoric development of man himself. Au- 

 thentic data proving the existence of refined 

 civilization and of highly developed art recede 

 backwards into an ever-increasing number of 

 prehistoric centuries as the archseologists extend 

 their researches in different parts of the globe. 

 And it should at the same time not be forgot- 

 ten that Huxley, more than thirty years ago, 

 expressed liimself in an almost prophetic way 

 in a sentence which mioht serve as a motto for 

 this lecture, when he said : " If any form of the 

 doctrine of progressive development is correct, 

 we must extend by long epochs the most lib- 

 eral estimate that has yet been made of the 

 antiquity of man." 



We may furthermore ask in how far the rea- 

 soning which we have applied to the order of 

 Primates, to their afhnities and to their devel- 

 opment in geological time, will in any way con- 



