Huxley then proceeds to discuss the development of man.
"Is he something apart? Does he originate in a totally different way from dog, bird, frog, and fish, thus justifying those who assert him to have no place in nature, and no real affinity with the lower world of animal life? Or does he originate in a similar germ, pass through the same slow and gradually progressive modifications, depend on the same contrivances for protection and nutrition, and finally enter the world by the help of the same mechanism? The reply is not doubtful for a moment, and has not been doubtful any time these thirty years. Without question, the mode of origin, and the early stages of the development of man are identical with those of animals immediately below him in the scale; without doubt, in these respects, he is far nearer the apes than the apes are to the dog."
Then, on lines with which, by continuous repetition and expansion by authors subsequent to him, we have now become familiar, Huxley compared, stage by stage, the development of man with that of other animals, and shewed, first, its essential similarity, and then that in every case where it departed from the development of the dog it resembled more closely the development of the ape. He went on to review the anatomy of man:
"Thus, identical in the physical processes by which he originates,--identical, in the early stages of his formation--identical in the mode of his nutrition before and after birth, with the animals which lie immediately below him in the scale,--Man, if his adult and perfect structure be compared with theirs exhibits, as might be expected, a marvellous likeness of organisation. He resembles them as they resemble one another--he differs from, them as they differ from one another. And, though these differences cannot be weighed and measured, their value may be readily estimated; the scale or standard of judgment, touching that value, being afforded and expressed by the system of classification of animals now current among zoölogists."
Having explained the general system of zoölogical classification, he tried to dispel preliminary prejudice by inducing his readers or bearers to take an outside view of themselves.