7G LECTURES ON EVOLUTION m 



preceding one. And I confess that I had too 

 much respect for your intelligence to think it 

 necessary to add that the negation was equally 

 clear and equally valid, whatever the source from 

 which that hypothesis might be derived, or what- 

 ever the authority by which it might be supported. 

 I further stated that, according to the third hypo- 

 thesis, or that of evolution, the existing state of 

 things is the last term of a long series of states, 

 which, when traced back, would be found to show 

 no interruption and no breach in the continuity 

 of natural causation. I propose, in the present 

 and the following lecture, to test this hypothesis 

 rigorously by the evidence at command, and to 

 inquire how far that evidence can be said to be 

 indifferent to it, how far it can be said to be 

 favourable to it, and, finally, how far it can be 

 said to be demonstrative. 



From almost the origin of the discussions about 

 the existing condition of the animal and vegetable 

 worlds and the causes which have determined 

 that condition, an argument has been put forward 

 as an objection to evolution, which we shall have 

 to consider very seriously. It is an argument 

 which was first clearly stated by Cuvier in his 

 criticism of the doctrines propounded by his great 

 contemporary, Lamarck. The French expedition 

 to Egypt had called the attention of learned men 

 to the wonderful store of antiquities in that 

 country, and there had been brought back to 



