272 THE OVARIAN EGG. 



of life in the individual solve that great mystery 

 of the beginning of life in the world. In other 

 words, they have endeavored to show that the 

 fact of successive generations is analogous to that 

 of successive creations, and that the processes by 

 which animals, once created, are maintained un- 

 changed during the period to which they belong, 

 will account also for their primitive existence. 



I wish, at the outset, to forestall any such mis- 

 application of the facts I am about to state, and 

 to impress upon my readers the difference between 

 these two subjects of inquiry, since it by no means 

 follows, that, because individuals are endowed 

 with the power of reproducing and perpetuating 

 their kind, they are in any sense self-originating. 

 Still less probable does this appear, when we con- 

 sider, that, since man has existed upon the earth, 

 no appreciable change has taken place in the ani- 

 mal or vegetable world ; and so far as our knowl 

 edge goes, this would seem to be equally true of 

 all the periods preceding ours, each one maintain- 

 ing unbroken to its close the organic character 

 impressed upon it at the beginning. 



The question I propose to consider here is 

 simply the mode by which organic types are pre- 

 served as they exist at present. Every one has a 

 summary answer to this question in the state- 

 ment that all these short-lived individuals repro- 

 duce themselves, and thus maintain their kinds. 



