at the Surface of the Terrestrial Olobe, 397 



Nothing is more worthy of our attention than the simulta- 

 neous appearance of the nine classes of invertebrate animals, 

 and we can only understand it by regarding these animals as 

 manifestations of particular tendencies of life, the principle 

 of which goes back as far as that which is displayed in the 

 appearance of vertebrate animals. But how great is the 

 difference in the case of the latter ! Of these there are only 

 four classes, and these classes made their appearance succes- 

 sively at the periods and in the order of their organic grada- 

 tion. There is here a real progress in the manifestation of 

 the organic characters which successively appeared, according 

 as at each epoch a new and higher class became detached from 

 the first trunk, while creation was approaching its termination. 



In regarding the whole animal kingdom in this point of 

 view, we cannot fail to recognise a premeditated plan, con- 

 nected together in all its parts. The idea of a superior in- 

 telligence, independent of creation, and which from the earliest 

 time fixed its phases, at once presents itself. It would be 

 impossible reasonably to attribute such a linking together in 

 the epochs of creation to a power unconscious in itself, acting 

 without rule, or according to immutable laws. A more power- 

 ful intervention than the organic forces of nature, reveals 

 itself to our intelligence in this succession of living beings en- 

 dowed with a temporary stability, and giving place, after hav- 

 ing existed without modifications during a given time, to other 

 beings whose duration was to be equally transient. To what- 

 ever influences recourse may be had as regards the finished 

 world, we cannot conceive of the sport Jineous formation of 

 living beings by the sole action, or by the combination, of pin - 

 sical forces. Hut here we must at the outset make a distinc- 

 tion between the establishment of the order of things which 

 has regulated the whole of nature from the commencement, 

 and has been maintained throughout all time, and the par- 

 ticular acts of creative will, which have only operated for the 

 establishment of particular portions forming part of the gene- 

 ral plan and in some measure only its consequence. The time 

 is therefore arrived when science likewise can recognise in 



nature God the Creator, the Author of all things, as he was 



)i.j la.. 



Jq/IoHf 



