DIFFICULTIES OF THE THEORY 167 



same reason tells us, though we may easily err on both sides, that 

 some other contrivances are less perfect. Can we consider the sting 

 of the bee as perfect, which, when used against many kinds of 

 enemies, cannot be withdrawn, owing to the backward serratures, 

 and thus inevitably causes the death of the insect by tearing out 

 its viscera? 



If we look at the sting of the bee, as having existed in a remote 

 progenitor, as a boring and serrated instrument, like that in so 

 many members of the same great order, and that it has since been 

 modified but not perfected for its present purpose, with the poison 

 originally adapted for some other object, such as to produce galls, 

 since intensified, we can perhaps understand how it is that the use 

 of the sting should so often cause the insect's own death: for if on 

 the whole the power of stinging be useful to the social communitv, 

 it will fulfil all the requirements of natural selection, though it 

 may cause the death of some few members. If we admire the truly 

 wonderful power of scent by which the males of many insects find 

 their females, can we admire the production for this single purpose 

 of thousands of drones, which are utterly useless to the commu- 

 nity for any other purpose, and which are ultimately slaughtered 

 by their industrious and sterile sisters? It may be difficult, but we 

 ought to admire the savage instinctive hatred of the queen-bee, 

 which urges her to destroy the young queens, her daughters, as 

 soon as they are born, or to perish herself in the combat; for un- 

 doubtedly this is for the good of the community; and maternal 

 love or maternal hatred, though the latter fortunately is most 

 rare, is all the same to the inexorable principles of natural selec- 

 tion. If we admire the several ingenious contrivances by which 

 orchids and many other plants are fertilized through insect agency, 

 can we consider as equally perfect the elaboration of dense clouds 

 of pollen by our fir-trees, so that a few granules may be wafted by 

 chance on to the ovules? 



summary: the law of unity of type and of the conditions 

 OF existence embraced by the theory of natural selec- 

 tion 



We have in this chapter discussed some of the difficulties and 

 objections which may be urged against the theory. Many of them 

 are serious ; but I think that in the discussion light has been thrown 

 on several facts, which on the belief of independent acts of crea- 

 tion are utterly obscure. We have seen that species at any one 

 period are not indefinitely variable, and are not linked together 

 by a multitude of intermediate gradations, partly because the 



