form of misunderstanding, which is very prevalent. I find, in fact,
that those who endeavour to teach what nature so clearly shows us in
this matter, are liable to have their opinions misrepresented and their
phraseology garbled, until they seem to say that the structural
differences between man and even the highest apes are small and
insignificant. Let me take this opportunity then of distinctly
asserting, on the contrary, that they are great and significant; that
every bone of a Gorilla bears marks by which it might be distinguished
from the corresponding bone of a Man; and that, in the present
creation, at any rate, no intermediate link bridges over the gap
between 'Homo' and 'Troglodytes'.

It would be no less wrong than absurd to deny the existence of this
chasm; but it is at least equally wrong and absurd to exaggerate its
magnitude, and, resting on the admitted fact of its existence, to
refuse to inquire whether it is wide or narrow. Remember, if you will,
that there is no existing link between Man and the Gorilla, but do not
forget that there is a no less sharp line of demarcation, a no less
complete absence of any transitional form, between the Gorilla and the
Orang, or the Orang and the Gibbon. I say, not less sharp, though it is
somewhat narrower. The structural differences between Man and the
Man-like apes certainly justify our regarding him as constituting a
family apart from them; though, inasmuch as he differs less from them
than they do from other families of the same order, there can be no
justification for placing him in a distinct order.

And thus the sagacious foresight of the great lawgiver of systematic
zoology, Linnaeus, becomes justified, and a century of anatomical
research brings us back to his conclusion, that man is a member of the
same order (for which the Linnaean term PRIMATES ought to be retained)