' 17^£^ 



m 



THE BEGINNINGS OF LIFE. 



105 



^^0' low 



H. 



'"^^^^Jves ^ 



'al cha 



\V 



nRes • 



e 



^^e to 



i? 



& reason to 



[ 



through changes in those conditions which are fatal 

 to beings of higher structure and more specialized 

 constitution j whilst, on the other, they undergo such 

 modifications under the influence of those changes as 

 may produce a very wide departure from the original 

 type/ These views now seem somewhat inconsistent 



t 



Cj 



linifcra t&w ^^^ contradictory. Extreme variability is predicated 

 'indent ' *^^ ^^ '^"^ hand, and yet extreme stability is affirmed to 



have been displayed through long geologic ages. Doubt- 

 less, the ' conditions ' obtaining at the bottom of deep 

 oceans in past times may not have been very different 

 from what they are at present ^ ; but such uniformity of 



not entail the long-continued pre- 



-semblance 

 Lttcr and the- 



^e thinks tlitt 



as far as tie, conditions could 



the reasons (i servation of the same simple structural types, unless 



similarity, w we suppose that all internal causes of change in the 



-'It can scaic: organisms themselves had ceased to exist. And. yet 

 f the leadifll^ the continuous existence of internal causes of change 



) 



h so lonff a %■ is, in reality, the essential attribute of living matter, 



of similar^' which could no more have been absent from Forami- 



, f ^he fj nifera during all these ages of apparent non-development, 



• A finite^' ^^^" ^^ ^^ absent at the present day in the ever- varying 



diversity of ^^^ 

 , they pass ""^ 



:, fiat or 



flj< 



:reative- 

 ^ce of each/j;, 



the reader '°^ 



roduction 



to 



the 



Fungi, Algx, and Lichens, which astonish us by their 

 rapid and protean changes of form. It is certain, 

 moreover, that those who believe exclusively in the 



J- 



1 If certain lower organisms, therefore, developed into Foraminifera 

 in remote geologic ages, there is no reason why they should not develop 

 in the present day into essentially similar forms; and variation may 

 now tend to manifest itself in the same fashion as it did formerly, owing 

 to the fact that the causes (both intrinsic and extrinsic) leading to this 

 variation are essentially similar. 



