498 CONCLUSION. 



and rising naturalists, who will be able to view both sides 

 of the question with impartiality. Whoever is led to be- 

 lieve that species are mutable will do good service by con- 

 scientiously expressing his conviction ; for thus only can the 

 load of prejudice by which this subject is overwhelmed be 

 removed. 



Several eminent naturalists have of late published their 

 belief that a multitude of reputed species in each genus are 

 not real species; but that other species are real, that is, 

 have been independently created. This seems to me a 

 strange conclusion to arrive at. They admit that a multi- 

 tude of forms, which till lately they themselves thought 

 were special creations, and which are still thus looked at 

 by the majority of naturalists, and which consequently have 

 all the external characteristic features of true species — 

 they admit that these have been produced by variation, 

 but they refuse to extend the same view to other and 

 slightly different forms. Nevertheless, they do not pretend 

 that they can define, or even conjecture, which are the 

 created forms of life, and which are those produced by 

 secondary laws. They admit variation as a vera causa in 

 one case, they arbitrarily reject it in another, without as- 

 signing any distinction in the two cases. The day will 

 come when this will be given as a curious illustration of 

 the blindness of preconceived opinion. These authors seem 

 no more startled at a miraculous act of creation than at an 

 ordinary birth. But do they really believe that at 

 innumerable periods in the earth's history certain ele- 

 mental atoms have been commanded suddenly to flash into 

 living tissues? Do they believe that at each supposed act 

 of creation one individual or many were produced? "Were 

 all the infinitely numerous kinds of animals and plants 

 created as eggs or seed, or as full grown? and in the case 

 of mammals, were they created bearing the false marks of 

 nourishment from the mother's womb? Undoubtedly some 

 of these same questions cannot be answered by those who 

 believe in the appearance or creation of only a few forms 

 of_ life, or of some one form alone. It has been main- 

 tained by several authors that it is as easy to believe in the 

 creation of a million beings as of one; but Maupertuis' 

 philosophical axiom "of least action "leads the mind more 

 willingly to admit the smaller number; and certainly we 



