EXTINCTION CAUSED BY NATURAL SELECTION.
This subject will be more fully discussed in our chapter on Geology; but it
must here be alluded to from being intimately connected with natural
selection. Natural selection acts solely through the preservation of
variations in some way advantageous, which consequently endure. Owing to
the high geometrical rate of increase of all organic beings, each area is
already fully stocked with inhabitants, and it follows from this, that as
the favoured forms increase in number, so, generally, will the less
favoured decrease and become rare. Rarity, as geology tells us, is the
precursor to extinction. We can see that any form which is represented by
few individuals will run a good chance of utter extinction, during great
fluctuations in the nature or the seasons, or from a temporary increase in
the number of its enemies. But we may go further than this; for as new
forms are produced, unless we admit that specific forms can go on
indefinitely increasing in number, many old forms must become extinct.
That the number of specific forms has not indefinitely increased, geology
plainly tells us; and we shall presently attempt to show why it is that the
number of species throughout the world has not become immeasurably great.
We have seen that the species which are most numerous in individuals have
the best chance of producing favourable variations within any given period.
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