WHAT IS EVOLUTION? 41 



stable and dangerous combinations, else no one s life 

 would be for a moment safe. 



Fortunately, ^geological history so completely, 

 negatives this idea, by showing the extreme perma 

 nence of many forms of life which have continued to 

 propagate themselves through almost immeasurable 

 ages and great changes of environment, without 

 material variation, and the apparent fixity of these in 

 their final forms,\that we are relieved from the dread 

 which this nightmare of German brains tends tof 

 create. 



Viewed rightly, the direct equilibration of the 

 parts of animals and plants is so perfect and so stable, 

 and such great evils arise from the slightest disturb 

 ance of it by the selective agency of man, that it be 

 comes one of the strongest arguments against the 



&quot;~ 



production of new species by variation. \This has 

 been well shown by Mr. T. Warren O Neill, of Phila 

 delphia, 1 who adduces a great number of facts, detailed 

 by Darwin himself, to show that when the stability of 

 an organism is artificially altered by man in his 

 attempt to establish new breeds, infertility and death 

 of these varieties or breeds results ; and if this hap 

 pens under the fortuitous selection supposed to occur 

 in nature, any considerable variation would result 

 either in speedy return to the original type or in 

 speedy extinction. In other words, so beautifully 

 balanced is the organism, that an excess or deficiency 



1 Refutation of Darwin. Philadelphia, 1880. 



