VARIATIONS, DUE TO REVERSION. 9t 



It is difficult to conceive, how any one, who looks 

 this evidence fairly in the face, can entertain the 

 slightest doubt that the cause which Darwin pro- 

 fesses to have sought in vain, to explain variations, 

 is furnished by the regain of long-lost characters of 

 the varying species; or, by reversion. The reader 

 will mark, that it is variation which constitutes the 

 problem, not development in general. Development 

 in general, is Darwin's problem; but he chose to 

 solve that problem by the problem of variations. 

 His failure to solve the subordinate problem should 

 alone suffice to demolish his theory of development. 

 A fortiori, is his theory destroyed, when there is found 

 a solution of the problem of variations, diametrically 

 opposed to such theory. 



To represent, as the author does, that he cannot 

 explain all of the variations or improvements, is to 

 affect an ignorance, simulated under the stress and 

 necessities of his theory. The impression, so wide- 

 spread and general, that species, taken from a state 

 of nature, are necessarily perfect, after their kind, aids 

 Darwin materially in cloaking the significance of this 

 law of reversion. The current conception, hut most 

 erroneous one, is, that all improvements which animals 

 or plants make, after they are placed under domestica- 

 tion, is clear gain, or advance upon what they normally 

 should be. This idea has even been carried so far, as 

 to induce some scientists (?) to maintain, that Provi- 

 dence has introduced something plastic into organisms 

 under domestication, which enables them to vary, 

 in order that they might be of better use to man. 

 9* 



