THE FALLACIES OP NATURAL SELECTION. 163 



and from Darwin's own facts, is, that the variations, 

 which he gratuitously assumes to occur under nature, 

 are but the mere regain of developments, lost by the 

 respective species in which they occur. 



Given, the variations which he asks ; assuming, 

 even, that as many variations occur under nature, as 

 are known to occur under domestication, and they 

 avail Darwin nothing. The presumption is, that the 

 species, in so varying, are but retrieving past de- 

 generation. 



Concede-the efficiency of Natural Selection, in pre- 

 serving and accumulating such variations, and it aids 

 Darwin as little to attain the result he is so solicitous 

 to achieve ; for, if such variations are but the regain of 

 lost characters, and are limited to the number and kind 

 of such lost characters, how may Natural Selection con- 

 tinue long to accumulate, when the variations, which 

 it is to accumulate, needs must give out, when all the' 

 lost characters are regained ? 



There is, really, no limit to the potential efficiency 

 of Natural Selection. If the conditions of its opera- 

 tion would but hold out, it could perform all the won- 

 ders which Darwin ascribes to it. But they do not 

 hold out. No more characters can be regained, and 

 then accumulated by Natural Selection, than were lost- 

 Darwin has proceeded upon the false assumption, that 

 the gratuitously assumed variations under nature, are 

 new developments. But this assumption of new 

 growth or development is more than false; it is ex- 

 quisitely absurd, inasmuch as the very argument itself, 

 in which it appears, implies that it is false ! 



