WHAT IS DARWINISM f 41 



and even forty, tail-feathers, instead of the 

 normal number of twelve or fourteen. They 

 differ as much in instinct as they do in form. 

 Some are carriers, some pouters, some tum- 

 blers, some trumpeters ; and yet all are de- 

 scendants of the Rock Pigeon which is still 

 extant. If, then, he argues, man, in a com- 

 paratively short time, has by artificial selection 

 produced all these varieties, what might be 

 accomplished on the boundless scale of nature, 

 during the measureless ages of the geologic 

 periods. 



Secondly, he uses the word natural as anti- 

 thetical to siipernatural. Natural selection is 

 a selection made by natural laws, working with- 

 out intention and design. It is, therefore, op- 

 posed not only to artificial selection, which is 

 made by the wisdom and skill of man to accom- 

 plish a given purpose, but also to supernatural 

 selection, which means either a selection orig- 

 inally intended by a power higher than na- 

 ture ; or which is carried out by such power. 

 In using the expression Natural Selection, Mr. 

 Darwin intends to exclude design, or final 

 causes. All the changes in structure, instinct, 

 or intelligence, in the plants or animals, includ- 

 ing man, descended from the primordial germ, 



