THE ORIGIN OF THE ANIMATED TRIBES. 103 



of marvel, and placed under an idea of divine regulation which 

 we may endlessly admire and trust in. 



Mixed up, however, with the geognostic changes, and appa- 

 rently as a final object connected with the formation of the 

 globe itself, there is another set of phenomena presented in the 

 course of our history the coming into existence, namely, of a 

 long suite of living things, vegetable and animal, terminating 

 in the families which we still see occupying the surface. The 

 question arises In what manner has this set of phenomena 

 originated ? Can we touch at and rest for a moment on the 

 possibility of plants and animals having likewise been produced 

 in a natural way ; thus assigning immediate causes of but one 

 character for everything revealed to our sensual observation ; 

 or are we at once to reject this idea, and remain content, 

 either to suppose that creative power here acted in a different 

 way, or to believe unexaminingly, that the inquiry is one 

 beyond our powers ? 



Taking the last question first, I would reply, that I am 

 extremely loth to imagine that there is anything in nature 

 which we should, for any reason, refrain from examining. If 

 we can infer aught from the past history of science, it is, that 

 the whole of nature is a legitimate field for the exercise of our 

 intellectual faculties ; that there is a connexion between this 

 knowledge and our well-being ; and that, if we may judge 

 from things once despaired of by our inquiring reason, but now 

 made clear and simple, there is none of Nature's mysteries 

 which we may not hopefully attempt to penetrate. To re- 

 main idly content to presume a various class of immediate 

 causes for organic nature, seems to me, on this ground, 

 equally objectionable. 



With respect to the other question. The idea has several 

 times arisen, that some natural course was observed in the 

 production of organic things, and this even before we were 

 permitted to attain clear conclusions regarding inorganic nature. 

 It was always set quickly aside, as unworthy of serious con- 

 sideration. The case is different now, when we have admitted 

 law in the whole domain of the inorganic. There are even 

 some considerations on the very threshold of the question, 

 which appear to throw the balance of likelihood strongly on 

 the side of natural causes, however difiicult it may be to say 

 what these causes were. The production of the organic world 

 is, we see, mixed up with the production of the physical. It 

 is mixed in the sense of actual connexion and dependence, and 



