NATURAL SELECTION INSUFFICIENT TO DEVELOPMENT OF MAN. 1 7 
thick fur of the bear, nor the warm wool of the sheep. Was 
it any advantage to the first individual that came into the 
world with this soft, smooth skin, or with any approximation 
to it, beyond his fellows? Was it a peculiarity likely to help 
him in the struggle for life — to enable him to survive when 
others perished ? — likely, therefore, when transmitted to his 
offspring, to appear in greater force in the next generation ; 
and gradually, by its superior adaptation to surrounding cir- 
cumstances, to supplant the tough or hairy skins which had 
preceded and accompanied it? Was it likely, in short, to 
become an object of natural selection? Is it not, on the 
contrary, quite plain that the very reverse would be the case ? 
The accidental possessor of this smooth skin would clearly be 
at a great disadvantage. He would succumb beneath the 
attacks of enemies which his hardier fellows could successfully 
resist. Eain and frost and cold would work their bitter will 
upon him unchecked. Inclement seasons, which only produced 
a moderate inconvenience, or none at all, to creatures with 
thick or shaggy hides, would soon prove fatal to the animal we 
are imagining. There is no conceivable reason why such an 
animal should live and perpetuate his peculiarity,- while others 
which did not possess it perished ; there is, on the contrary, 
every reason to suppose that such an animal, born for the first 
time, an anomaly in a shaggy world, would speedily be elimi- 
nated and leave no trace behind him. That is to say, it is 
impossible to picture a condition of things in which a kind of 
creatures distinguished by smooth skins could have arisen by 
the process of natural selection. In other words, natural selec- 
tion cannot account for the origin of this peculiarity in the 
human form. 
But that is not all. The theory of natural selection not 
only requires that every change promoted by it should be for 
the benefit of the possessor ; it requires also that it should be 
for his direct and immediate benefit; that it should be no 
greater than is necessary to give him some instant advantage, 
however slight, over his fellows. For it does not act, any more 
than Nature herself, per saltum. It rests for its motive force 
upon the variation which always exists between a parent and 
an offspring ; and this variation is, for the most part, very slight* 
It is enough to distinguish one from the other, but never much 
more. It is generally so small that the unpractised eye often 
fails to see any difference whatever. We do not mistake our 
friends for their fathers, though, if we do not know them well, 
we are liable sometimes to get confused between brothers and 
sisters ; but, except to the shepherd, a flock of sheep seem to 
be all exactly alike. The differences between individuals of 
the same kind are for the most part very small, and it is only 
VOL. X. — NO. XXXVIII. C 
