necessary for the first movement, for the first step in the 

 line of progress. "How can speech, the expression of 

 thought, develop itself in a year or in millions of years, out 

 of unarticulated sounds which express feelings of pleasure, 

 pain, and appetite? The common-sense of mankind will 

 always shrink from such theories." 



4. The hopes and fears of Darwinians have rightly 

 been centered on the history of organic development as 

 outlined in the geological record. It has been pointed out 

 repeatedly by the foremost men of science that if the the- 

 ory of genetic descent with the accumulation of small vari- 

 ations be the true account of the origin of species, a com- 

 plete record of the ancestry of any existing species would 

 reveal no distinction of species and genera. Between any 

 two well-defined species, if one be derived from the other, 

 there must be countless transition forms. But palaeon- 

 tology fails to support the theory of evolution by minute 

 variations. Darwinism has been shattered on the geologic 

 rocks. "The complete absence of intermediate forms," 

 says Mr. Carruthers, "and the sudden and contemporane- 

 ous appearance of highly organized and widely separated 

 groups, deprive the hypothesis of genetic evolution of any 

 countenance from the plant record of these ancient rocks. 

 The whole evidence is against evolution (i. e., by minute 

 modification) and there is none for it." (cf. History of 

 Plant Life and its Bearing on Theory of Evolution, 1898). 

 Similar testimony regarding the animal kingdom is 

 borne by Mr. Mivart in the following carefully 

 worded statement: "The mass of palaeontological evi- 



20 



