108 E VOL UTION A ND DOGMA . 



but he gave it a significance it never before pos- 

 sessed. He showed that it was in reality the only 

 natural system, and the only one which was compe- 

 tent to explain the varied and complicated facts of 

 the organic world. He demonstrated more clearly 

 than had any of his predecessors the impossibility of 

 attempting, as had Lamarck and others, to arrange 

 animals and plants in a series of linear groups. By 

 classifying animals in lineally ascending groups, 

 Lamarck had placed snails and oysters above such 

 marvelously organized creatures as bees and butter- 

 flies. The same system of classification would place 

 the humble duck-bill, because it is a mammal, above 

 the eagle and the condor, the lowly amphioxus 

 above the crab, and the degraded lepidosiren above 

 the salmon. 



Again, the tree-like system of classification eludes 

 such blunders and shows that differences of structure, 

 and not complexity of organization, are to be con- 

 sidered in every rational attempt to ascertain the 

 true position of any organism in the animal king- 

 dom. Unlike all popular classifications, it is not 

 based on mere external resemblances, but on resem- 

 blances which are deeper and more fundamental. 

 Thus, for instance, a whale is often regarded as a 

 fish, because, forsooth, it bears some likeness to a 

 fish in form and habits. A closer examination, how- 

 ever, reveals the fact that it is more like a dog or an 

 ox than a fish. The same may be said of other 

 cases that might be cited, wherein the true position 

 of an organism in the scale of life can be determined, 

 not by superficial resemblances, but by likenesses 



