Page:Carroll Lane Fenton - A History of Evolution (1922).djvu/15

 12 ties. And yet, despite its deficiencies, this chain was the best conception of animal development and descent to be produced in more than twenty centuries.

Unfortunately, Aristotle saw nothing of value in the crude survival suggestion of Empedocles. He believed that there was a purpose, a continued striving after beauty, in all the variations of plants and animals, and allowed nothing whatever to what we, for lack of better knowledge, call "chance variation." He did, however, restate Empedocles' position in modern, scientific language in order that he might refute it the more ably. He argues strongly for his conception of purpose in evolution, saying, "It is argued that where all things happened as if they were made for some purpose, being aptly united by chance, these were preserved, but such as were not aptly made, these were lost and still perish." He then makes reference to the way which Empedocles used this conception to explain the non-existence of the mythical monsters of olden time, states again that nothing is produced by chance, and closes with the statement, "There is, therefore, a purpose in things which are produced by, and exist from, Nature."

Aristotle was far and away ahead of any other evolutionist of ancient times; indeed, had he turned his genius to the clarification and support of the survival hypothesis, instead of combating it, he might have been properly considered as the "Greek prophet of Darwinism." His teachings were opposed by the philosopher