THEORY OF EVOLUTION 29 



the species, but rather the escape of the species 

 from tlie old into a new world. 



If then we recognize the intimate bond in 

 chemical constitution of living things and of the 

 world in which they develop, what is there im- 

 probable in St. Hilaire's hypothesis? Why, in 

 a word is not more credit given to St. Hilaire 

 in modern evolutionary thought '. The reasons 

 are to be found, 1 think, first, in tliat the evi- 

 dence to wliich he appealed was meagre and 

 inconclusive; and, second, in that much of his 

 special evidence does not seem to us to be ap- 

 plicable. For example the monstrous forms 

 that development often assumes in a strange 

 environment, and with wliicli every embryolo- 

 gist is only too familiar, rarely if ever furnish 

 combinations, as he supposed, that are capable 

 of livin"-. On the contrary, they lead ratlier to 

 the final catastrophe of the organism. And 

 lastly, St. Hilaire's appeal to sudden and great 

 transformations, such as a crocodile's ^^g 

 hatching into a bird, has exposed his view to too 

 easy ridicule. 



But when all is said, St. Hilaire's conception 

 of evolution contains elements that form the 



