﻿2 EVOLUTION IN THE PAST 



Charles Darwin, and he will ever be remembered as 

 having first placed the doctrine of Evolution on a sound 

 basis. 



The Evolution doctrine receives strong support from facts 

 ascertained in the study of embryos. Organisms in their 

 embryonic condition pass through stages in which they 

 resemble the young of animals lower in the scale of life. A 

 rabbit, for instance, in its immature condition passes through 

 a stage in which it resembles a young reptile. Rudimentary 

 organs also make a transitory appearance. Gill-clefts, for 

 instance, appear in the embryonic history of all the higher 

 animals. This takes the latter at least as far back as am- 

 phibians. And amphibians in their embryonic growth pass 

 through stages in which they resemble fishes. These em- 

 bryonic phases are only explainable on the hypothesis that, 

 in the origination of higher animals, lower animals took a 

 direct ancestral part. 



The doctrine of Evolution is also supported by evidence 

 brought to light from the geological strata. Innumerable 

 fossils have been found testifying to successive developments 

 undergone by life in the course of past ages. Evidence of 

 this direct nature — incomplete though it is — is of the greatest 

 help. The sequence of life thus revealed is quite in accordance 

 with an evolutionary process — the lower forms preceding the 

 higher. And remains of numerous animals are found com- 

 bining features that became distributed in later forms. 

 Phenacodus of the Eocene, for instance, was more or less 

 closely related to deer, pigs, tapirs, horses, and carnivores. 

 Then remains of toothed birds with long lizard-like tails 

 have been exhumed (Archczopteryx), showing that early bird 

 life retained some very remarkable affinities with reptiles. 

 Pedigrees of particular animal forms have also been recovered. 

 The ancestral history of elephants, for instance, would be a 

 matter for speculation but for fossil evidence. 



Existing life also makes important contributions. In the 

 light of comparative anatomy creation is certainly more 

 suggestive of an organic whole than of an assemblage of 

 independently formed types. Small organisms are found 

 that cannot be classed satisfactorily either as plants or as 



