I SPECIAL CREATION THEORIES 23 



living species occur only very seldom in strata of some 

 antiquity, and that the present fauna, for instance, is 

 quite different from the various faunas which lived in 

 the different geological epochs. 



(3) A large number of living beings specially 

 created at the beginning, having been killed by various 

 cataclysms, they have been created anew after 

 the catastrophes which, in Cuvier's opinion, are the 

 necessary concomitants of every geological epoch. 

 This is Cuvier's hypothesis of the " revolutions of 

 the earth." It may seem somewhat puerile to sup- 

 pose that the Creator has seen His own doing turn 

 against Him, and oblige Him to begin His work 

 anew, on repeated occasions. 



(4) All species have been specially created from 

 the beginning, but while some die out gradually, other 

 new ones put in a sudden appearance, for reasons 

 hitherto unexplained. 



This is only a part of an hypothesis, as it does not 

 explain why or how new species appear, which is 

 exactly the problem to be solved. 



On the adverse, non-special creation side, we have 

 only one hypothesis, the evolutionary one, which sup- 

 poses all living species to have been evolved from 

 antecedent and different organisms all organisms 

 having perhaps been evolved out of a single ele- 

 mentary one, born we know not how, but certainly 



