EMBRYOLOGY AND PAST HISTORY. 143 



argument from embryology is, therefore, similar 

 in its nature to that which has been found in classi- 

 fication and paleontology, but it is at the same time 

 a more forcible argument. It is much easier to 

 understand that even on the theory of special crea- 

 tion of species, animals should have appeared in the 

 order we have discovered, and should be related to 

 each other according to a tree-like schema, than to 

 understand why the embryo should go so much out 

 of its way to repeat stages which have never been 

 comprised in the history of its own ancestry. 



It is hardly necessary to do more than state this 

 argument, for its force is one that each individual 

 must settle in his own mind. The facts are as 

 stated, the conclusion from them each must de- 

 termine for himself. The teachings of embryology, 

 since the appearance of the " Origin of Species," 

 have been found to be in harmony with the descent 

 theory ; its very contradictions, when rightly under- 

 stood, forming the strongest confirmation of the 

 fact. The embryologist, finding how perfectly the 

 facts harmonize, is simply unable to avoid the con- 

 clusion that the fact of an animal being embryologi- 

 cally derived from an older form, is proof that his- 

 torically the same descent is true. He is unable to 

 avoid the use of the term relationship, or to avoid 

 interpreting the word as meaning ^^-relationship. 

 And so the matter stands to-day. That the develop- 

 ment of the individual repeats the development of 

 the race, is a fact abundantly demonstrated. The 

 theory of evolution offers the only natural solution 

 of the fact, an explanation which, when thoroughly 



