Wallace. He continues:--
"The objections now made to Darwin's theory apply solely to the
particular means by which the change of species has been brought
about, not to the fact of that change."
But "Darwin's theory"--as Mr. Wallace has elsewhere proved that he
understands--has no reference "to the fact of that change"--that is
to say, to the fact that species have been modified in course of
descent from other species. This is no more Mr. Darwin's theory
than it is the reader's or my own. Darwin's theory is concerned
only with "the particular means by which the change of species has
been brought about"; his contention being that this is mainly due to
the natural survival of those individuals that have happened by some
accident to be born most favourably adapted to their surroundings,
or, in other words, through accumulation in the common course of
nature of the more lucky variations that chance occasionally
purveys. Mr. Wallace's words, then, in reality amount to this, that
the objections now made to Darwin's theory apply solely to Darwin's
theory, which is all very well as far as it goes, but might have
been more easily apprehended if he had simply said, "There are
several objections now made to Mr.
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