Continental and Island Life [pp. 1-29]

THE PRINCE TON RE VIEW.
It seems singular, in view of the facts of paleontology, that
evolutionists of the Darwinian school are so wedded to the idea
of one introduction only of each form of life, and its subsequent
division by variation into different species, as it progressively
spreads itself over the globe or is subjected to different external
conditions. It is evident that a little further and very natural extension of their hypothesis would enable them to get rid
of many difficulties of time and space For example, certain
millipedes and batrachians are first known in the coal-formation,
and this not in one locality only, but in different and widely separated regions. If they took beginning in one place and spread
themselves gradually over the world, this must have required a
vast lapse of time, more than we can suppose probable. But if,
in the coal-formation age, a worm could anywhere change into a
millipede, or a fish into a batrachian, why might not this haveoccurred in many places at once? Again, if the oldest known
land snails occur in the coal-formation and we find no more specimens till a much later period, why is it necessary to suppose
that these creatures existed in the intervening time, and that
the later species are the descendants of the earlier? Might not
the process have been repeated again and again, so as to give
animals of this kind to widely separated areas and successive
periods without the slow and precarious methods of continuous
evolution and migration? This apparent inconsistency strikes one
constantly in the study of "Island Life," when we find the author laboriously devising expedients for the introduction of animals into the most unlikely places, when it would seem that they
might just as well have originated in those places by direct evolution from lower forms. Those who believe in a separate centre of creation for each species must of course invoke all geological and geographical possibilities for the dispersion of animals and plants; but surely the evolutionist, if he has faith in
his theory, might take a more easy and obvious method, especially when in any case he is under the necessity of demanding
a great lapse of time. That he does not adopt this method perhaps implies a latent suspicion that he must not repeat his miracle too often. He also perceives that if repeated and unlimited
evolution of similar forms had actually occurred, there could
have remained little specific distinctness, and the present rarity
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