I will devote this chapter to the consideration of various miscellaneous
objections which have been advanced against my views, as some of the
previous discussions may thus be made clearer; but it would be useless to
discuss all of them, as many have been made by writers who have not taken
the trouble to understand the subject. Thus a distinguished German
naturalist has asserted that the weakest part of my theory is, that I
consider all organic beings as imperfect: what I have really said is, that
all are not as perfect as they might have been in relation to their
conditions; and this is shown to be the case by so many native forms in
many quarters of the world having yielded their places to intruding
foreigners. Nor can organic beings, even if they were at any one time
perfectly adapted to their conditions of life, have remained so, when their
conditions changed, unless they themselves likewise changed; and no one
will dispute that the physical conditions of each country, as well as the
number and kinds of its inhabitants, have undergone many mutations.
A critic has lately insisted, with some parade of mathematical accuracy,
that longevity is a great advantage to all species, so that he who believes
in natural selection "must arrange his genealogical tree" in such a manner
that all the descendants have longer lives than their progenitors! Cannot
our critics conceive that a biennial plant or one of the lower animals
might range into a cold climate and perish there every winter; and yet,
owing to advantages gained through natural selection, survive from year to
year by means of its seeds or ova? Mr.
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