The Hawaiian gazette. [volume] (Honolulu [Oahu, Hawaii]) 1865-1918, 1877-02-07
EvolutIon.-Once More.

these arguments from a variety Of sources
sources which are not easily accessible e
most Of them-and in this way we think that
we are doing the public favor. We are
aware that some Of them have blamed us for
modelling with the subject, surprising that the
discussion was calculated TO destroy the
foundations of faith in the Bible, and. cOuse-
queutly, in the Christian religion. We have
no such apprehensions,
We give below some extracts from President
Seelye's criticism, which ccntains the strongest
arguments against the theory yet presented.
President seelyc's Criticism on Darwinism,
abridged from Johnson's Cyolopusdia;
Ti,rasn,ariios Of Species nsrsr VI obssrresi,
Huxley. after having deliberately advocated
the Darwinian hypothesis, nevertheless de-
clares it SIS his clear conviction that, as the
evidence now stands, IT is not absolutely proven
that group Of animals, having all the char
aoieristics exhibited by species in nature, has
ever been originated nv selection, whether
artificial or natural"
alt is well to keep this fact in mind The
Darwinian hypothesis, however plausible in
its statement or ingenious in its application,
is, al the best, only possibility, and wholly
wants the evidence which can translate it into
the actual explanation Of the facts to which
it applies. That species vary, and some of
them to great extent, is admitted by all; but
in no recorded observation do they cease to be
the same species still. Cuvier has shown,
from Egyptian monuments and mummies, that
the animals which lived in that country in the
earliest records of its civilization are identical
in species with those which live there to-day /;
and AgassiE has shown, from the coral reefs
in Florida, that the animals Of the Gulf Of
Mexico were Of the same species $4,000 years
ago, as in the present time. Though man has
been able to secure numerous and surprising
variations within given species, he has never
succeeded in obliterating the original lines of
specific distinction, or in bringing out any
thing more prominent in their place The
difference Of dogs strike the dullest eye; and
yet Owen, an authority inferior to none, de-
clares that under the EXTREMIST mark of
variety SO superinduced, the naturalist de-
tects the unmistakable generic and specific
characters Of olRis JiazilidIIS."
The same is the case with all the plants
upon which man has made such copious and
careful experiments. Not single instance Of
une species changing into another has been
found, The extended varieties which man
has brought out in some of our cultivated
plants, viz; the cabbage, the turnip, the beet,
the potato,--and from which he derives such
benefit, are only kept up by constant cultiva-
ton. The plant left to itself reyerts to its
wild state to man, its comparatively useless
state.
Now, while all these things show that the
transmutation Of species has nos fact which
can prove it, and is at the best but cOnjec-
ture, they render most unlikely the conjecture
itself For IN the numberiess species which
have been infinitely observed, over great
space and for long time, if there were such
5 tendency to transmutation, how is it posi-
bic that no actual case Of it has ever been
found Why are not cases occurring all the
time, and before our eyesS Darwin admits
the force Of this inquiry. but we cannot yield
10 the fitness of his reply. he argues that in
the struggle for life, the improved offspring
would exterminate the inferior progeuitor, and
thus the old form disappears by the very pro
cess Of the formation of the new. But, if this
be true, and if the process Of formation be
going on before cur eyes, why not that of the
also? In many animals the /
duration of the individual life is so short, and |
he succession Of generations so rapid, that if |
his process Of transmutstion were actually at
work, how could it fail to have furnished,
hus far, a single instance Of its accomplished 4
ruits
GsologioE Eridezce. If one species springs
rom another by long continued process of
low variation and natural selection, the steps
through which parent has become lost in his
are very many-indeed, are Prsc-
ically innumerable. Says Darwin: = If my
heory be true, numberless intermediate varie-
les, linking closely all the species of the same
Toup together, must assuredly have existed
also, if the theory be true, some
violence Of these intermediate varieties must
ssuredly exist in the geological record. But
% such evidence appears. Looking through
Il the vast cycles of tine which geological
hanges are supposed to imply, we find the
anne clear distinctions Of species as we OBJ
erve in the historic period. Upon this there
; no dispute. Dar3in admits It, and so do
is disciples This fact is sufficient to startle,
not to stagger, the boldest advocate of the
heory. Darwin acknowledges II to have the
Tsvesi force, but its weight is not essentially
sssened by his very ingenious attempt to re-
love it His explanation rests, in the main,
pom the extreme imperfection Of the gsolO-
ical record. Says that eminent geologist,
II Charles Lyell, at is scarcely possible to
Iaggerate the effectiveness of our archives.
q the solid framework Of the globe, great
art Of what remains is inaccessible to man;
I'd even Of that fraction which is accessible,
ine-tenths are to this day UNEMPLOYED" But |
le facts which the paleoniologist offers are
either few nor incOnsideraHe. More than
!. 600 species Of animals have already been !