THE CENTURY'S PROGRESS IN BIOLOGY 



fessor Cope calls the " origin of the fittest " be accepted, 

 there still remains one great life problem which the doc- 

 trine of evolution does not touch. The origin of species, 

 genera, orders, and classes of beings through endless 

 transmutations is in a sense explained ; but what of the 

 first term of this long series? Whence came that pri- 

 mordial organism whose transmuted descendants make 

 up the existing faunas and floras of the globe? 



ERNEST HAECKEL 



There was a time, soon after the doctrine of evolution 

 gained a hearing, when the answer to that question 

 seemed to some scientists of authority to have been 



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