"
What inference could be more aptly drawn? But it was not one which
Buffon was going to put before the general public. He had said enough
for the discerning, and continues with what is intended to make the
conclusions they should draw even plainer to them, while it conceals them
still more carefully from the general reader.
"The naturalists who are so ready to establish families among animals and
vegetables, do not seem to have sufficiently considered the consequences
which should follow from their premises, for these would limit direct
creation to as small a number of forms as any one might think fit
(reduisoient le produit immediat de la creation, aun nombre d'individus
aussi petit que l'on voudroit). _For if it were once shown that we had
right grounds for establishing these families_; _if the point were once
gained that among animals and vegetables there had been_, _I do not say
several species_, _but even a single one_, _which had been produced in
the course of direct descent from another species_; _if for example it
could be once shown that the ass was but a degeneration from the
horse_--_then there is no further limit to be set to the power of
nature_, _and we should not be wrong in supposing that with sufficient
time she could have evolved all other organised forms from one primordial
type_ (_et l'on n'auroit pas tort de supposer_, _que d'un seul etre elle
a su tirer avec le temps tous les autres etres organises_).
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