If you object further, and call attention to the fact that in the great geological record, of which evolutionists boast so much, that not even in that can be found the intermediate transitional forms that should, according to their theory, link together by fine gradations the species[E]—this objection, otherwise fatal to the theory of evolution, is avoided rather than answered by putting forth the claim that the geological record is very imperfect, and comparatively only a few of its pages have, as yet, been read by man.
[Footnote E: Geology assuredly does not reveal any such finely graduated organic chain; and this, perhaps, is the most obvious and serious objection which can be urged against the theory [of evolution.] The explanation lies, as I believe, in the extreme imperfection of the geological record.—Darwin, Origin of Species p. 205.]
After thus escaping from the difficulty of there being no intermediate transitional forms between the species, we come to other facts not less important, and even, perhaps, more fatal to the hypothesis of evolution—I refer to the phenomena presented by "hybrids," and in order that I may not be charged with over-estimating the value of the objection founded on this class of phenomena, I shall quote the words of Professor Huxley, one of the chief apostles of evolution, and give his estimate of the weight of the objections:
"There is a most singular circumstance," says the professor, "in respect to natural species—at least about some of them—and it would be sufficient for the purposes of this argument, if it were true of only one of them; but there is, in fact, a great number of such cases—and that is, that similar as they may appear to be to mere races or breeds, they present a marked peculiarity in the reproductive process. If you breed from the male and female of the same race, you of course have offspring of the like kind; and if you make the offspring breed together, you obtain the same result; and if you breed from these again, you will still have the same kind of offspring; there is no check. But if you take members of two distinct species, however similar they may be to each other, and make them breed together, you will find a check, with some modifications and exceptions— * * * if you cross two such species with each other, then,— although you may get offspring in the case of the first cross, yet if you attempt to breed from the products of that crossing, which are what are called hybrids[F]—that is, if you couple a male and a female hybrid—then the result is that in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred you will get no offspring at all; there will be no result whatsoever, * * * Thus you see that there is a great difference between 'mongrels,' which are crosses between distinct races [varieties], and 'hybrids,' which are crosses between distinct species. The mongrels are, so far as we know, fertile with one another. But between species, in many cases, you cannot succeed in obtaining the first cross; at any rate it is quite certain that the hybrids are often absolutely infertile one with another. Here is a feature, then, great or small as it may be, which distinguishes natural species of animals."[G]
[Footnote F: The product of the horse and the ass—the mule—is an example.]
[Footnote G: Huxley's Lectures, pp. 106, 107.]
Now, by the side of these facts, the sterility of species and hybrids, let us place another; that of the fertility of varieties. So long as you breed together descendants from a common stock they continue fruitful to each other, without any check. Now, if naturalists cannot produce by selective breeding varieties from a common parentage that are infertile to each other, then it is quite clear that species did not come from varieties by the process of variation preserved by natural selection, since here is a phenomenon existing in connection with species which cannot, to all appearances, be produced by breeding together varieties. Mr. Huxley remarks on this, that if it could be proven not only that this has not been done, but that it cannot be done, then Mr. Darwin's hypothesis would be utterly shattered.[H] Well, up to the present it has not been done, the gentleman last quoted admits the fact; he asks, "what is really the state of the case? It is simply that, so far as we have gone yet with our breeding, we have not produced from a common stock two breeds, which are not more or less fertile with one another."[I]
[Footnote H: Huxley's Lectures, p. 141.]
[Footnote I: Lectures, p. 141.]
What do these facts prove, I mean the sterility of species and hybrids on the one hand, and the fertilities of varieties, descendants from a common stock, on the other? Why that the great law of nature is, as announced in holy writ that every seed shall produce after its kind, and every fish, fowl, creeping-thing, beast, and man shall bring forth after his kind[J]—that is what it proves. And though man may for a moment by crossing species cause a slight deviation from that great law, it can be but for an instant, the monstrosity cannot be perpetuated, it dies out by being made unfruitful.