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The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from On the Origin of Species by Charles Darwin: the geology of other countries beyond the confines of Europe and the United
States; and from the revolution in our palaeontological ideas on many
points, which the discoveries of even the last dozen years have effected,
it seems to me to be about as rash in us to dogmatize on the succession of
organic beings throughout the world, as it would be for a naturalist to
land for five minutes on some one barren point in Australia, and then to
discuss the number and range of its productions.
On the sudden appearance of groups of Allied Species in the lowest known
fossiliferous strata. -- There is another and allied difficulty, which is
much graver. I allude to the manner in which numbers of species of the
same group, suddenly appear in the lowest known fossiliferous rocks. Most
 On the Origin of Species |