Personal Conclusion

Conclusion 1 (of the people)*

Nature, in creating the animals, anticipated all the possible circumstances they would encounter.

And so it gave to each species:

• a fixed organic structure
• a determined and invariable form for its parts

This forces each species to:

• live in those places and climates where it is located
• maintain there its habits

This is univerasally the current belief of people.

It assumes that:

• in each animal is a constant organic structure and parts which have never varied and which will never vary
• the circumstances in the places where each species live in never varies

If they did vary:

• the same animals would no longer be alive.
• the possibility of finding other similar circumstances and of transporting themselves there would be forbidden to them.

Conclusion 2 (My Own)

Nature produces in succession all the animal species.

It begins with the most imperfect or the simplest.

Gradually, it makes the organic structure more complicated.*

As these animals generally spread out into all the habitable regions of the world, each species encounters the influence of circumstances.

Each acquires their habits and the modifications in its parts.

It assumes that through the influence of circumstances on habits and later the influence of habits on the condition of the parts and even on the condition of the organic structure, each animal can undergo in its parts and organic structure modifications capable of becoming really significant.

This has given rise to the condition in which we find all the animals.

To disprove my theory, the following should be proven:

• each location on Earth never varies its nature, exposure, elevation, climate, etc.
• even after long periods of time, no part of animals undergoes any modification occasioned by:
  • a change in its circumstances
  • the necessity which forces them to a lifestyle and action different from what is habitual to them

Conclusion 1 does not conform at all to natural laws if:

• a domesticated animal after a long time becomes different from the wild species where it came from
• the domesticaed animal gets those differences from habits that we have forced onto them

These facts match my theory.

Thus, facts prove my assertion that is is not the form which gives rise to the habits and the lifestyle of animals.

In contrast, it is the habits, the manner of life, and all the other influential circumstances which have, over time, shaped the form of the body and the parts of animals.

With new shapes, new faculties were acquired, and gradually nature came to the point of creating the animals such as we see them now.

Could there be in natural history a more important conclusion, one to which we ought to give more attention, than the one with I have just revealed?