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I believe that we are clearly of the same descent with animals 

 of the various kinds, as proved by the number of our vertebrae. 

 I believe also, that we are clearly of the same descent as 

 birds, because of our similitude to them in our imperfect condition 

 before birth. Birds, I admit, have not the same number of 

 vertebrae that we have, but if you think that I shall allow that 

 this overturns my argument, you are very much mistaken. You 

 may call it a " meddle and muddle " if you like. I do not. I 

 have spoken. I am not bewildered not a bit of it. 



I believe that all organised beings have been produced by em- 

 pirical efforts at the cost of myriads of imperfect experiments, 

 though " on the theory of Creation " there is every appearance of 

 One Mind, master of the whole work, foreseeing the end from the 

 beginning, holding all forms of life in view, having them all, as it 

 were, in its hand, and all carried out on one plan. 



I believe that Natural Selection has made any animal perfect 

 only after "exterminating " enormous numbers of experimental 

 ones; failures in fact, like Beau Brummell's neck-ties, so that the 

 world has been one vast shambles of incalculable slaughter for an 

 inconceivable period of time. You may say that I have not 

 found them. I know that. Did I ever say that I had ? It is 

 true, I grant, that the remains of not one individual of all these 

 failures has ever been found by any one, l>ut I have only to say 

 that they ought to have been or ought to be, for there must 

 have been heaps, hills, mountains, mountains upon mountains of 

 them, "Pelion upon Ossa " (ay, ossa, bones indeed), over and 

 over again to build my theory on. 



I believe that " Natural Selection results from the struggle for 

 existence," or in plainer English, is the Result of Destruction; 

 yes, every part of every animal, the wing of the bat, and the 

 hand of the ape, is so. The whole of Nature is one great 

 battle-field, in which every living creature, and every part of 

 each, has only been produced by the destruction of its ancestors, 

 time out of mind, and could only have "survived" by the 

 "extermination" o competitor in hecatombs, so that its 



own life is, after all, only a triumphant blunder and murder. 



I believe that the l.nnes in the arm of the monkey, the wing 

 of the bat, the fore leg of the horse, and the flipper of the seal, 



