questions can be answered in the affirmative, Mr. Darwin's view steps
out of the rank of hypotheses into those of proved theories; but, so
long as the evidence at present adduced falls short of enforcing that
affirmation, so long, to our minds, must the new doctrine be content to
remain among the former--an extremely valuable, and in the highest
degree probable, doctrine, indeed the only extant hypothesis which is
worth anything in a scientific point of view; but still a hypothesis,
and not yet the theory of species.

After much consideration, and with assuredly no bias against Mr.
Darwin's views, it is our clear conviction that, as the evidence
stands, it is not absolutely proven that a group of animals, having all
the characters exhibited by species in Nature, has ever been originate
by selection, whether artificial or natural. Groups having the
morphological character of species, distinct and permanent races in
fact, have been so produced over and over again; but there is no
positive evidence, at present, that any group of animals has, by
variation and selective breeding, given rise to another group which
was, even in the least degree, infertile with the first. Mr. Darwin is
perfectly aware of this weak point, and brings forward a multitude of
ingenious and important arguments to diminish the force of the
objection. We admit the value of these arguments to their fullest
extent; nay, we will go so far as to express our belief that
experiments, conducted by a skilful physiologist, would very probably
obtain the desired production of mutually more or less infertile
breeds from a common stock, in a comparatively few years; but still,
as the case stands at present, this "little rift within the lute" is
not to be disguised nor overlooked.

In the remainder of Mr. Darwin's argument our own private ingenuity has