Appendix to Chapter V. 435 



some special explanation ; and we may perhaps believe that we 

 see, in these large areas, the many formations long anterior to 

 the Cambrian epoch in a completely metamorphosed and 

 denuded condition 1 ." The probability of this view he 

 sustains by certain general considerations, as well as par- 

 ticular facts touching the geology of oceanic islands, &c. 



On, the whole, then, it seems to me but reasonable to 

 conclude, with regard to all four objections in question, as 

 Darwin concludes with regard to them: 



For my part, following out Lyeli's metaphor, I look at the 

 geological record as a history of the world imperfectly kept, 

 written in a changing dialect ; of this history we possess the last 

 volume alone, relating only to two or three countries. Of this 

 volume, only here and there a short chapter has been preserved ; 

 and of each page only here and there a few lines. Each word of 

 the slowly-changing language, more or less different in the 

 successive chapters, may represent the forms of life, which 

 are entombed in our consecutive formations, and which falsely 

 appear to us to have been abruptly introduced. On this view, 

 the difficulties above discussed are greatly diminished, or even 

 disappear 2 . 



As far as I can see, the only reasonable exception that 

 can be taken to this general view of the whole matter, is one 

 which has been taken from the side of astronomical 

 physics. 



Put briefly, it is alleged by one of the highest authorities 

 in this branch of science, that there cannot have been any 

 such enormous reaches of unrecorded time as would be 

 implied by the supposition of there having been a lost history 

 of organic evolution before the Cambrian period. The 

 grounds of this allegation I am not qualified to examine ; 

 but in a general way I agree with Prof. Huxley in feeling 

 that, from the very nature of the case, they are necessarily 



1 Origin of Species, p. 289. 



2 Ibid. 



F f 2 



