38 THE SKULL THEORY 



human species as a whole was long since developed 

 from the order of apes, indeed actually from one (or 

 perhaps more) long since extinct form of ape ; the 

 immediate progenitors of man in the long series of his 

 vertebrate ancestry were apes or ape-like animals. Of 

 course none of the now surviving species of apes is 

 to be regarded as the unaltered posterity of that 

 primeval parent-form. Virchow, however, understand- 

 ing the " ape question " in this sense, answers it, as 

 Bastian also does, with the most positive contradiction. 

 " We cannot teach the doctrine that man is descended 

 from apes or from any other animal, for we cannot' 

 regard it as a real acquisition of science" (p. 31). 

 Although I myself, in direct opposition to this view, 

 and in agreement with almost all my professional 

 colleagues, look upon the descent of man from apes as 

 one of the surest of phylogenetic hypotheses, I will 

 here expressly admit that the relative certainty of this, 

 as of all other historical hypotheses of descent, is not 

 comparable with the absolute certainty of the general 

 theory of descent. It is now ten years since I first 

 explicitly stated (in my " Natural History of Crea- 

 tion," vol. ii. p. 358): " The pedigree of the 

 human race, like that of every animal or plant, 

 remains in detail a more or less approximate 

 general hypothesis. This, however, in no way 

 affects the application of the theory of descent 



