| → his products be, 1859 1860 1861 1866 |
| be his results, 1869 1872 |
|
| → every variation, even 1859 1860 1861 1866 |
| OMIT 1869 1872 |
|
| → rejecting that which is 1859 1860 1861 1866 |
| variations; rejecting those that are 1869 1872 |
|
|
and a short beaked pigeon on the same food; he does not exercise a long-backed or long-legged quadruped in any peculiar manner; he exposes sheep with long and short wool to the same climate. He does not allow the most vigorous males to struggle for the females. He does not rigidly destroy all inferior animals, but protects during each varying season, as far as lies in his power, all his productions. He often begins his selection by some half-monstrous form; or at least by some modification prominent enough to catch
or to be plainly useful to him. Under nature, the slightest
of structure or constitution may well turn the nicely-balanced scale in the struggle for life, and so be
How fleeting are the wishes and efforts of man! how short his time! and consequently how poor will
→his products be,
compared with those accumulated by
during whole geological
Can we wonder, then, that
productions should be far "truer" in character than
productions; that they should be infinitely better adapted to the most complex conditions of life, and should plainly bear the stamp of far higher workmanship? |
|
| It may
said that natural selection is daily and hourly scrutinising, throughout the world,
→every variation, even
the
→rejecting that which is
bad, preserving and adding up all that
good; silently and insensibly working,
at the improvement of each organic being in relation to its organic and
conditions of life. We see nothing of these slow changes in progress, until the hand of time has marked the
lapse of ages, and then so imperfect is our view into
geological ages, that we
that the forms of life are now different from what they formerly were.
|
