It is _never_ that the highest plant can be connected with the lowest
animal as in one series of links. The animal kingdom and the plant
kingdom are absolutely apart. Both start from similar elementary
proteinaceous structures; and both preserve their development
upwards--each exhibiting _some_ of the features of the other. It is at
the bottom of each scale that resemblance is to be found, _not_ between
the top of one and the lowest members of the other.]
The Evolution theory is that all the different species of animals,
birds, and other forms of life have been caused by the accumulation and
perpetuation of numerous small changes which began in one or at most a
few elementary forms, and went on till all the thousands of species we
now know of were developed.[1] It _is_ a fact that all organic forms
have a certain tendency to vary. I need only allude to the many
varieties of pigeons, horses, cattle, and dogs which are produced by
varying the food, the circumstances of life and so forth, and by
selective breeding.
The contention then is: given certain original simple forms of life,
probably marine or aquatic--for it is in the water that the most likely
occur--these will gradually change and vary, some in one direction, some
in another; that the changes go on increasing, each creature giving
birth to offspring which exhibits the stored-up results of change, till
the varied and finished forms--some reptile, some bird, some
animal--which we now see around us, have been produced.
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