Hence, the structure of each part of each species, for whatever purpose it may serve, is the sum of many inherited changes, through which the species has passed during its successive adaptations to changed habits and conditions of life.

Finally, then, although in many cases it is most difficult even to conjecture by what transitions organs could have arrived at their present state; yet, considering how small the proportion of living and known forms is to the extinct and unknown, I have been astonished how rarely an organ can be named, towards which no transitional grade is known to lead.

It is certainly true, that new organs appearing as if created for some special purpose rarely or never appear in any being; as indeed is shown by that old, but somewhat exaggerated, canon in natural history of "Natura non facit saltum.