66 SPECIES NOT 



in some degree probable that man, sufficiently 

 civilized to have manufactured pottery, existed 

 in the Valley of the Nile thirteen or fourteen 

 thousand years ago; and who will pretend to 

 say how long before these ancient periods, savages, 

 like those of Tierra del Fuego or Australia, who 

 possess a semi-domestic dog, may not have existed 

 in Egypt?" 



Now seriously let us compare these phases of 

 Mr. Darwin's argument. If savages, similar to 

 those of Tierra del Fuego or Australia, which 

 are known to be human now, existed for an 

 indefinite period before fourteen thousand years, 

 how can Mr. Darwin assume, with the slightest 

 reason or plausibility, that in a "few thousand 

 v< ;irs" the human form will have become altered, 

 while still living on the earth? How, in fact, 

 does he reconcile the assumed antiquity of the 

 Inunan race with his theory of the increase of 

 population being checked by the altered form, 

 on its. road to perfection destroying the less 

 perfectly-organized being? There is some con- 

 solation, however, for us who may have descendants 

 in such a struggle, in the full belief we are 

 told to' entertain, "that the war of nature is 

 not incessant, that no fear is felt, that death 

 is generally prompt, and that the vigorous, the 

 healthy, and the happy survive and multiply/ 7 

 -(Page 79.) 



But with all due deference to these merciful 

 considerations, I should strongly advise the 

 hum a ri race to look out sharply for the first 



