We see this in the fact that the most eminent
palaeontologists, namely, Cuvier, Agassiz, Barrande, Pictet, Falconer, E.
Forbes, etc., and all our greatest geologists, as Lyell, Murchison,
Sedgwick, etc., have unanimously, often vehemently, maintained the
immutability of species. But Sir Charles Lyell now gives the support of
his high authority to the opposite side, and most geologists and
palaeontologists are much shaken in their former belief. Those who believe
that the geological record is in any degree perfect, will undoubtedly at
once reject my theory. For my part, following out Lyell's metaphor, I look
at the geological record as a history of the world imperfectly kept and
written in a changing dialect. Of this history we possess the last volume
alone, relating only to two or three countries. Of this volume, only here
and there a short chapter has been preserved, and of each page, only here
and there a few lines. Each word of the slowly-changing language, more or
less different in the successive chapters, may represent the forms of life,
which are entombed in our consecutive formations, and which falsely appear
to have been abruptly introduced. On this view the difficulties above
discussed are greatly diminished or even disappear.
CHAPTER XI.
ON THE GEOLOGICAL SUCCESSION OF ORGANIC BEINGS.
On the slow and successive appearance of new species -- On their different
rates of change -- Species once lost do not reappear -- Groups of species
follow the same general rules in their appearance and disappearance as do
single species -- On extinction -- On simultaneous changes in the forms of
life throughout the world -- On the affinities of extinct species to each
other and to living species -- On the state of development of ancient forms
-- On the succession of the same types within the same areas -- Summary of
preceding and present chapters.
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