hooks. Parasitic plants and their degradation. Tenants that
pay a liberal rent. The gardener as a creator of new flowers.
The modern sugar beet due to Mons. Vilmorin. 139

THE NATURALIST AS
INTERPRETER AND
SEER

THE ORIGIN OF SPECIES: THE ARGUMENT IN SUMMARY

CHARLES DARWIN

[Charles Darwin, one of the greatest men of all time, did
more to advance and prove the theory of evolution than
anybody else who ever lived. This he accomplished by virtue
of the highest gifts of observation, experiment, and
generalization. His truthfulness, patience, and calmness of
judgment have never been exceeded by mortal. His works are
published by D. Appleton & Co., New York, together with his
"Life and Letters," edited by his son Francis. From "The
Origin of Species" the argument in summary is here given.]

On the view that species are only strongly marked and permanent
varieties, and that each species first existed as a variety, we can see
why it is that no line of demarcation can be drawn between species,
commonly supposed to have been produced by special acts of creation, and
varieties which are acknowledged to have been produced by secondary
laws. On this same view we can understand how it is that in a region
where many species of a genus have been produced, and where they now
flourish, these same species should present many varieties; for where
the manufactory of species has been active, we might expect, as a
general rule, to find it still in action; and this is the case if
varieties be incipient species. Moreover, the species of the larger
genera, which afford the greater number of varieties or incipient
species, retain to a certain degree the character of varieties; for they
differ from each other by a less amount of difference than do the
species of smaller genera. The closely allied species also of a larger
genera apparently have restricted ranges, and in their affinities they
are clustered in little groups round other species--in both respects
resembling varieties. These are strange relations on the view that each
species was independently created, but are intelligible if each existed
first as a variety.

As each species tends by its geometrical rate of reproduction to
increase inordinately in number; and as the modified descendants of each
species will be enabled to increase by as much as they become more
diversified in habits