Item:
The uniformity of the earth's life,
more astonishing than its diversity,
is accountable by the high probability
that we derived, originally, from some single cell,
fertilized in a bolt of lightning as the earth cooled.
It is from the progeny of this parent cell
that we take our looks;
we still share genes around,
and the resemblance of the enzymes
of grasses to those of whales is
a family resemblance.
Lewis Thomas, Lives of a cell
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