The Origin of the World According to Revelation and ScienceDawson, John William, Sir
Religion
The Origin of the World According to Revelation and Science
Dawson, John William, Sir
Bible and science; Religion and science
structural characters probably of the original wild horse, have
appeared. We also learn from such instances that, while races among
domesticated animals may appear suddenly, they revert to the original
type, when unmixed, comparatively slowly; and this especially when the
variation is in the nature of degeneracy.
4. Some characters are more subject to variation than others. In the
higher animals variation takes place very readily in the color and
texture of the skin and its appendages. This, from its direct relation
to the external world, and ready sympathy with the condition of the
digestive organs, might be expected to take the lead. In those
domesticated animals which are little liable to vary in other
respects, as the cat and duck, the color very readily changes. Next
may be placed the stature and external proportions, and the form of
such appendages as the external ear and tail. All these characters are
very variable in domestic animals. Next we may place the form of the
skull, which, though little variable in the wild state, is nearly
always changed by domestication. Psychological functions, as the
so-called instincts of animals, are also very liable to change, and to
have these changes perpetuated in races. Very remarkable instances of
this have been collected by Sir C. Lyell[165] and Dr. Prichard.
Lastly, important physiological characters, as the period of
gestation, etc., and the structure of the internal organs connected
with the functions of nutrition, respiration, etc., are little liable
to change, and remain unaffected by the most extreme variations in
other points; and it is, no doubt, in these more essential and
internal parts that the tendency survives to return under favorable
circumstances to the original type.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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