Then And Then Only Is There A
Chance Of Any Satisfactory Result Being Obtained.
For unless the
exact nature of the difficulty be known first, who can attempt to
remove it?
Let me re-state the matter once again. All animals and
plants in a state of Nature are undergoing constant competition for
the necessaries of life. Those that can hold their ground hold it;
those that cannot hold it are destroyed. But as it also happens that
slight changes of food, of habit, of climate, of circumjacent
accident, and so forth, produce a slight tendency to vary in the
offspring of any plant or animal, it follows that among these slight
variations some may be favourable to the individual in whom they
appear, and may place him in a better position than his fellows as
regards the enemies with whom his interests come into collision. In
this case he will have a better chance of surviving than his fellows;
he will thus stand also a better chance of continuing the species,
and in his offspring his own slight divergence from the parent type
will be apt to appear. However slight the divergence, if it be
beneficial to the individual it is likely to preserve the individual
and to reappear in his offspring, and this process may be repeated ad
infinitum. Once grant these two things, and the rest is a mere
matter of time and degree. That the immense differences between the
camel and the pig should have come about in six thousand years is not
believable; but in six hundred million years it is not incredible,
more especially when we consider that by the assistance of geology a
very perfect chain has been formed between the two.
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