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Such was then the state of paleontologic science, and what we moreover knew sufficed to explain our attitude before this great cemetery of the plains of the Hardwigg Ocean.
But, pending the construction of a surer foundation than paleontology now possesses, it may be instructive, assuming for the nonce the general correctness of the ordinary hypothesis of geological contemporaneity, to consider whether the deductions which are ordinarily drawn from the whole body of paleontologic facts are justifiable.
Some years ago one of your Secretaries pointed out another kind of positive paleontologic evidence tending towards the same conclusion afforded by the existence of what he termed "persistent types" of vegetable and of animal life. He stated, on the authority of Dr.
Nearly 40,000 species of animals and plants have been added to the Systema Naturae by paleontologic research. This is a living population equivalent to that of a new continent in mere number; equivalent to that of a new hemisphere, if we take into account the small population of insects as yet found fossil, and the large proportion and peculiar organization of many of the Vertebrata.
Summing up the results of this discussion, we may justifiably assert that the conclusions derived from the observations and experiments made with evening-primroses and other plants in the main agree satisfactorily with the inferences drawn from paleontologic, geologic and systematic evidence. Obviously these experiments are wonderfully supported by the whole of our knowledge concerning evolution.
But if only one or two new species have survived, how can we tell whether they have originated-alone or together with others. This difficulty is still more pronounced in regard to paleontologic facts, as the remains of geologic swarms are often found, but the absence of numerous mutations can hardly be proved in any case.
Of course, the main arguments of the evolution theory rest upon morphologic, systematic, geographic and paleontologic evidence. But the question as to how we can coordinate the relation between existing species and their supposed ancestors is of course one of a physiologic nature.
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