,--and so onwards in ever
increasing circles of complexity. Not that under nature the relations
will ever be as simple as this. Battle within battle must be continually
recurring with varying success; and yet in the long run the forces are
so nicely balanced that the face of nature remains for long periods of
time uniform, though assuredly the merest trifle would give the victory
to one organic being over another. Nevertheless, so profound is our
ignorance and so high our presumption, that we marvel when we hear of
the extinction of an organic being; and as we do not see the cause, we
invoke cataclysms to desolate the world, or invent laws on the duration
of the forms of life!

OF NATURAL SELECTION; OR THE SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST

From the 'Origin of Species'

Several writers have misapprehended or objected to the term Natural
Selection. Some have even imagined that Natural Selection induces
variability, whereas it implies only the preservation of such variations
as arise and are beneficial to the being under its conditions of life.
No one objects to agriculturists speaking of the potent effects of man's
selection; and in this case the individual differences given by nature,
which man for some object selects, must of necessity first occur. Others
have objected that the term selection implies conscious choice in the
animals which become modified; and it has even been urged that as plants
have no volition, Natural Selection is not applicable to them! In the
literal sense of the word, no doubt. Natural Selection is a false term;
but who ever objected to chemists speaking of the elective affinities of
the various elements?--and yet an acid cannot strictly be said to elect
the base with which it in preference combines. It has been said that I
speak of Natural Selection as an active power or Deity; but who objects
to an author speaking of the attraction of gravity as ruling the
movements of the planets? Every one knows what is meant and is implied
by such metaphorical expressions; and they are almost necessary for
brevity. So again it is difficult to avoid personifying the word Nature;
but I mean by nature only the aggregate action and product of many
natural laws, and by laws the sequence of events as ascertained by us.
With a little familiarity such superficial objections will be forgotten.

We shall best understand the probable course of Natural Selection by
taking the case of a country undergoing some slight ph