180 Luck, or Cunning ? 
Again :— 
“‘ He who believes that each being has been created as we 
now see it, must occasionally have felt surprise when he 
has met,” &c. (p. 185). 
Here the argument evidently lies between descent and 
independent acts of creation. This appears from the para- 
graph immediately following, which begins, ‘“‘ He who 
believes in separate and innumerable acts of creation,” &c. 
We therefore understand descent to be the theory so fre- 
quently spoken of by Mr. Darwin as “ my.” 
Again :— 
“He who will go thus far, if he find on finishing this 
treatise that large bodies of facts, otherwise inexplicable, 
can be explained by the theory of descent, ought not to hesi- 
tate to go farther, and to admit that a structure even as 
perfect as an eagle’s eye might be formed by natural selection, 
although in this case he does not know any of the transi- 
tional grades ”’ (p. 188). 
The natural inference from this is that descent and 
natural selection are one and the same thing. 
Again :— 
“Tf it could be demonstrated that any complex organ 
existed which could not possibly have been formed by 
numerous, successive, slight modifications, my theory 
would absolutely break down. But I can find out no such 
case. No doubt many organs exist of which we do not 
know the transitional grades, more especially if we look 
to much-isolated species, round which, according to my 
theory, there has been much extinction ”’ (p. 189). 
This makes “my theory’’ to be “the theory that 
complex organs have arisen by numerous, successive, 
slight modifications ;’’ that is to say, to be the theory of 
descent with modification. The first of the two ‘“‘ my 
theory’s ” in the passage last quoted has been allowed to 
stand. The second became “ the theory ” in 1872. It is 
obvious, therefore, that ‘‘ the theory ’ means ‘‘ my theory;” 
