THE EVOLUTION OF MAN 



species differ considerably from one another, 

 some of them show even extreme differences. 

 Do they possibly represent four different primi- 

 tive stages of man? But every attempt to re- 

 construct them from a continuously ascending 

 line towards man is a complete failure. It is 

 true that each species has a number of its own 

 peculiar resemblances to man. But, it rather 

 seems that these resemblances are distributed 

 among them in a rather indiscriminate way, so 

 that they all supplement one another in a funda- 

 mental outline of man, but nevertheless do not 

 form an ascending chain of evidence. 



We now remember that strange creature of 

 Trinil, and our attention turns especially to the 

 gibbon. Is it possible that he could be a genuine 

 archetype, and that the orang-outang, the 

 chimpanzee and the gorilla could be merely un- 

 progressive branches? One thing cannot be de- 

 nied: this gibbon possesses indeed very strange 

 and portentous characteristics. It seems that 

 this ape actually brings us closer to the secret of 

 our descent. He is not a bestial gorilla, but a 

 much more gentle and soulful creature. ^Te can. 

 singthe^ music of the gc^le. a very strange case 

 in a mammal, which involuntarily reminds us 

 that it is precisely in man that language and song 



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