Mr. Buckle's Fallacies. 155 



difference between the hydra, whose body is but 

 one organ, feebly performing several functions, 

 and the elephant, whose body is a community of 

 organs, each powerfully performing its own pecul- 

 iar function: so vast, that many persons, even 

 after allowing for the accumulated influence of 

 causes which have been in operation for countless 

 ages, are unable to believe that the higher or- 

 ganism could have come from the lower, through 

 myriads of intermediate forms. Yet, if we are to 

 believe this, if we 'are to accept it as true, that 

 this continuous perfecting of all the physical and 

 mental faculties has been going on among the 

 lower tribes ever since life first appeared on the 

 earth, why are we to suppose that it has not 

 taken place in man ? Is it that, when man came 

 upon the stage, one of the most comprehensive 

 laws of nature was, by some miracle, suspended 

 forever in his case ? Is it that in the most per- 

 fect of organized beings, exhibiting both in struc- 

 ture and function the completest instance of the 

 evolutional process, that process could no longer 

 be carried on ? If we are to accept the develop- 

 ment theory at all, we must accept it without 

 limitations. We might as well say that the hu- 

 man race forms an exception to the operation of 

 the laws of gravitation or chemical affinity as to 



