ORIGIN OF SPECIES BY NATURAL SELECTION. 



I PROPOSE in this Paper to state, in so far as concerns the natural 

 history of Man, such objections to the Darwinian theory as 

 have occurred to me, and which obhge me to refuse my beUef 

 in opinions which have received the assent of many eminent 

 men of science. In doing so, I hope I shall be found to state 

 them in those terms of respect and deference which are justly 

 due to them and more especially to the ingenious, accom- 

 plished, and candid author of the theory. 



The Darwinian theory -was suggested by the well-known 

 difficulty of determining in plants and animals what it is 

 that constitutes a species when many species so closely 

 resemble others as to seem but mere varieties. Hence 

 it has been inferred that, in the course of countless ages, 

 a small number of crude types, through a process of bene- 

 ficial natural variations, have been transmuted into the 

 many species into which the organic world is now divided. 

 The object of the theory is to demonstrate that the whole 

 organic creation did not, as geological evidence would seem 

 to show, originate in a series of cataclysms, but, on the con- 

 trary, had its source in causes gradually and continuously 

 in action, and differing in no respect from those at present 

 in actual operation. This view supposes all organised beings 

 to be derived from a few, or even from one progenitor 

 or prototype. ' I cannot doubt,' says Mr. Darwin, ' that the 

 theory of descent by gradation embraces all the members of 

 the same class. T believe that animals have descended from 



