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 observe or think of, goes on also among the millions and scores of millions of individuals which are comprised in almost every species; and must get rid of the idea that chance determines which shall live and which die. For, although in many individual cases death may be due to chance rather than to any inferiority in those which die first, yet we cannot possibly believe that this can be the case on the large scale on which nature works. A plant, for instance, cannot be increased unless there are suitable vacant places its seeds can grow in, or stations where it can overcome other less vigorous and healthy plants. The seeds of all plants, by their varied modes of dispersal, may be said to be seeking out such places in which to grow; and we cannot doubt that, in the long run, those individuals whose seeds are the most numerous, have the greatest powers of dispersal, and the greatest vigour of growth, will leave more descendants than the individuals of the same species which are inferior in all these respects, although now and then some seed of an inferior individual may chance to be carried to a spot where it can grow and survive. The same rule will apply to every period of life and to every danger to which plants or animals are exposed. The best organised, or the most healthy, or the most active, or the best protected, or the most intelligent, will inevitably, in the long run, gain an advantage over those which are inferior in these qualities; that is, the fittest will survive, the fittest being, in each particular case, those which are superior in the special qualities on which safety depends. At one period of life, or to escape one kind of danger, concealment may be necessary; at another time, to escape another danger, swiftness; at another, intelligence or cunning; at another, the power to endure rain or cold or hunger; and those which possess all these faculties in the fullest perfection will generally survive.

Having fully grasped these facts in all their fulness and in their endless and complex results, we have next to consider the phenomena of variation, discussed in the third and fourth chapters; and it is here that perhaps the greatest difficulty will be felt in appreciating the full importance of the evidence as set forth. It has been so generally the practice to speak of variation as something exceptional and comparatively rare—as an abnormal deviation from the uniformity and stability of the