THE EVOLUTION OF MAN 



fishes, amphibians, reptiles and all other verte- 1 

 brates being contained in fish and no other verte- 

 jbrate existing beside them. 



This historical testimony happens to coincide 

 exactly with the conventional system in which 

 the fish follow immediately after the reptiles and 

 amphibians. A fish is distinguished from an 

 adult newt, frog, lizard, turtle, bird or mammal, 

 including man, by the way in which it breathes. 

 All other vertebrates breathe through lungs in 

 the open air. But fish represent a perfect adapt- 

 ation to life in the water. Since a fish, however, 

 also requires air for breathing, it has developed 

 an organ which, being continuously surrounded 

 by water, can assimilate the air contained in this 

 water. This organ consists of the so-called gills 

 located in the neck of the fish. 



Now, it is a fact well known to every school 

 boy that the so-called tadpole hatches out of the 

 eggs of newts, frogs and toads. This tadpole 

 lives exclusively in the water exactly like a fish, 

 and breathes only through regular gills. Not un- 

 til the newt or frog abandons the early stage of 

 the larva, does it acquire the faculty of breath- 

 ing through genuine lungs and shed the gills, 

 much in the same way that human children shed 

 their milk teeth. The tadpole is nothing less 



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