14 Darwinism and Other Essays. 



mammals the preservation of the individual bears 

 a very much higher ratio to the preservation of 

 the race. But with the immense classes of fishes, 

 insects, and crustaceans, as well as the sub-king 

 dom of mollusks, which taken together make 

 up by far the greater portion of the animal world, 

 the destruction continually going on is prob 

 ably not less than that which is described in the 

 example cited. Even if we were to take account 

 only of the individuals which survive the embryo 

 or larva state, but do not succeed in leaving off 

 spring behind them, the cases of destruction would 

 still bear an enormous ratio to the cases of pres 

 ervation. But in maintaining the characteristics 

 of a race only those individuals can be counted 

 who produce offspring. It is obvious, then, that 

 each species of organisms, as we know it, consists 

 only of a few favoured individuals selected out of 

 countless multitudes who have been tried and re 

 jected as unworthy to live. No selection that is 

 exercised by man compares in rigour with this. 

 It is somewhat as if a breeder of race-horses were 

 to choose, with infallible accuracy of judgment, 

 the two or three fleetest out of each hundred 

 thousand, destroying all the rest, that the high 

 standard of the breed might run no possible risk 

 of deterioration. In such a rigorous competition 



