These assumptions are, with the exception of the first two, merely
the application to Eozoon of what have been called the Darwinian laws
of multiplication, of limited population, of variation, of change
of physical conditions, and of equilibrium of nature. If otherwise
proved, and shown to be applicable to creatures like Eozoon, of course
we must apply them to it; but in so far as that creature itself is
concerned they are incapable of proof, and some of them contrary to
such evidence as we have. We have, for example, no connecting link
between Eozoon and any form of vegetable life. Its structures are such
as to enable us at once to assign it to the animal kingdom, and if we
seek for connecting links between the lower animals and plants, we have
to look for them in the modern waters. We have no reason to conclude
that Eozoon could multiply so rapidly as to fill all the stations
suitable for it, and to commence a struggle for existence. On the
contrary, after the lapse of untold ages the conditions for the life of
Foraminifers still exist over two-thirds of the surface of the earth.
In regard to variation, we have, it is true, evidence of the wide range
of varieties of species in Protozoa, within the limits of the group,
but none whatever of any tendency to pass into other groups. Nor can
it be proved that the conditions of the ocean were so different in
Cambrian or Silurian times as to preclude the continued and comfortable
existence of Eozoon. New creatures came in which superseded it, and
new conditions more favourable in proportion to these new creatures;
but neither the new creatures nor the new conditions were necessarily
or probably connected with Eozoon, any farther than that it may
have served newer tribes of animals for food, and may have rid the
sea of some of its superfluous lime in their interest. In short, the
hypothesis of evolution will explain the derivation of other animals
from Eozoon if we adopt its assumptions, just as it will in that case
explain anything else; but the assumptions are improbable, and contrary
to such facts as we know.
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