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in the progeny of some kinds of animals there are often well- 
defined varieties ? G-ranted. But are varieties the same as 
species ? Certainly not. There are, we admit, very many 
varieties of dogs, and of cats, of pigeons, and of fowls. But 
the dog tribe is distinguished from the cat tribe by well- 
defined marks, as is also the family of the pigeons from the 
family of the fowls. And what is more, each in the fulfilment 
of the great purpose of its life always seeks the companion- 
ship of one of its own kind, and in the process of time another 
of its kind is produced by, and of, its own kind, which thing, 
as far as evidence can be furnished, has always been the case. 
The mummy cats and ibisses of Egypt are identical with the 
cats and ibisses of to-day. If, then, the sum of the changes 
of four thousand years is nil, what right has Dr. Haeckel to 
assume that the sum of the changes of forty thousand years is 
the development of an ape out of a monera ? 
Many eminent scientists of the present day, while not 
agreeing, it may be, with Professor Haeckel as to the exact 
lines on which the gradual development of the higher verte- 
brates from the lower vertebrates has run ; nor yet as to the pro- 
duction of life at the first, yet regard the doctrine of evolution 
as proven ; and hence these leaders of scientific thought, 
both in their addresses and in their writings, take the thing 
for granted. The result of this is, that not to agree with 
them in this particular is to lay yourself open to the charge 
of being unscientific. But to this we demur. To be scientific 
is not merely to acquiesce in opinions, but to possess know- 
ledge — truth ascertained and systematized. 
Kespecting the general question of the origin of species 
by natural selection, let us suppose the point in dispute re- 
versed. Suppose, then, that we were everywhere surrounded 
with proofs of the transmutation of species, and the opponents 
of evolution to assume that though species did not at the 
present time breed true, yet in the far distant past they did, 
but that somehow or other all was altered now, — what would 
the evolutionists say ? Would they not argue thus ? We see 
around us the evidence of change ; the known present is one 
of transmutation of species. Proceeding, then, from the 
known present to the unknown past, we conclude that what 
is true in the present was true in the past, and therefore 
you are wrong in assuming that true species were pro- 
duced at the first by the direct agency of the Great First 
Cause. 
In this they would, we think, be right. 
Now look at the case as it stands. We are everywhere 
surrounded with the evidence of the non-transmutation of 
