10 MARXISM AND DARWINISM. 



with general approval. These naturalists could not 

 prove the correctness of this theory and, therefore, it 

 remained only a hypothesis, a mere assumption. When 

 Darwin came, however, with his main book, The 

 Origin of Species, it struck like a thunderbolt; his 

 theory of evolution was immediately accepted as a 

 strongly proved truth. Since then the theory of evolu- 

 tion has become inseparable from Darwin's name. Why 

 so? 



This was partly due to the fact that through ex- 

 perience ever more material was accumulated which 

 went to support this theory. Animals were found 

 which could not very well be placed into the classifica- 

 tion such as oviparous mammals (that is, animals 

 which lay eggs and nourish their offspring from their 

 breast. — Translator) fishes having lungs, and inverte- 

 brate animals. The theory of descent claimed that 

 these are simply the remnants of the transition be- 

 tween the main groups. Excavations have revealed 

 fossil remains which looked different from animals 

 living now. These remains have partly proved to be 

 the primitive forms of our animals, and that the prim- 

 itive animals have gradually developed to existing 

 ones. Then the theory of cells was formed ; every 

 plant, every animal, consists of millions of cells and 

 has been developed by incessant division and differen- 

 tiation of single cells. Having gone so far, the thought 

 that the highest organisms have descended from prim- 

 itive beings having but a single cell, could not appear 

 as strange. 



All these new experiences could not, however, 

 raise the theory to a strongly proved truth. The best 

 proof for the correctness of this theory would have 

 been to have an actual transformation from one animal 



