244 From Matter to Man. 



and acquiring a skeleton or backbone, he develops 

 gill-like slits on each side of his neck up to which the 

 arteries run in arching branches as in a fish ; while his 

 heart is a simple pulsating chamber like that of the 

 lowest fishes. Nextly, he is a tadpole with branchiae. 

 At a later period he is a mammal with a movable tail 

 considerably longer than the legs, while the great toe 

 projects from the foot like the toes of adult apes. 

 During the sixth month the whole body is thickly 

 covered with fine wool-hair, extending even over the 

 face and ears, everywhere indeed, save on the lower 

 sides of the hands and feet — which are also bare in 

 the adult form of the monkey. Only at a still later 

 period does the embryo show signs of becoming a man 

 instead of remaining a gorilla. 



Man's embryological development thus indicates a 

 rising scale of being evolved in the womb, paralleled 

 by existing animal life as evolved by natural laws on 

 the earth's surface; hence, biologists naturally infer, 

 and the evidence seems overwhelming, that the 

 embryonic stages of man's development but illustrate 

 what actually occurred in prehistoric ages during 

 man's gradual development, during countless centuries, 

 from his spontaneously produced ovule. 



The orthodox, however, pertinently ask, If man 

 evolved spontaneously by natural laws thousands of 

 years ago, why is he not evolved spontaneously now ; 

 and why cannot we trace him in some of his lower 

 transitions — his ape-like, frog-like, fish-like, oyster- 

 like, and amceba-like phases ? The answer is obvious. 



