436 t CONCLUDING REMARKS. 



It has to recommend it, that it is in full accordance 

 with all the facts of Variation. 



It has to recommend it, that the weight of probabili- 

 ties is in its favor. 



It has to recommend _ it, that there is no converse 

 assumption competent to explain the facts of Variation. 



It has to recommend it, that the law of Reversion to 

 which it looks for an explanation, is a well-known 

 scientific factor. 



It has to recommend it, that there is no fact which is 

 inconsistent with such explanation. 



It has to recommend it, that, in default of such ex- 

 planation, there is no recourse but to a metaphysical 

 entity, an "innate tendency." 



But, great as are the intrinsic defects of Darwin's 

 theory, and overpowering as are the above considera- 



or variegation of colors is proper and normal to any given species. 

 The difficulty lies in this : When any other feature is abnormal in 

 any way, evil is entailed by self-fertilization, or by close-interbreeding, 

 either immediately or when such process has been long continued. 

 In such way, the abnormal character is ascertained: But, with an 

 abnormal color, the evil entailed thereby, is so inappreciably small, 

 that the test of interbreeding, or of self-fertilization, is practically 

 valueless. 



As has been before remarked, the Converse Theory, propounded in 

 this work, has relation, directly, solely to the problem of Variations. 

 Darwin's problem was, How species were evolved. But, in the so- 

 lution of such problem, he employed these Variations as his data, and 

 contended that the species were evolved simply by the indefinite ac- 

 cumulation of such Variations. To confute him, a converse theory 

 of the Evolution of the Species, was not needed, but a converse theory, 

 merely, of his data, namely the Variations. Such theory has here 

 been supplied, showing that the evolution of species was not accom- 

 plished by means of Variations ; that each species is normally im- 



