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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: tend to increase till they come to equal the greater differences between
species of the same genus, or even of distinct genera.
We have seen that it is the common, the widely-diffused, and widely-ranging
species, belonging to the larger genera, which vary most; and these will
tend to transmit to their modified offspring that superiority which now
makes them dominant in their own countries. Natural selection, as has just
been remarked, leads to divergence of character and to much extinction of
the less improved and intermediate forms of life. On these principles, I
believe, the nature of the affinities of all organic beings may be
explained. It is a truly wonderful fact--the wonder of which we are apt to
overlook from familiarity--that all animals and all plants throughout all
On the Origin of Species |
