Facts and Suppositions. 9 



sufficiently multiplied to preserve their races from the perse- 

 cution of these ferocious beasts \ Were all animals, and the 

 innumerable tribes of ferocious fishes which live upon smaller 

 ones, to abstain from food till these had been multiplied to a 

 sufficient extent to secure their preservation \ Or were, per- 

 haps, the carnivorous animals created only at a later period ? 

 But we find them everywhere together. They constitute 

 natural, harmonious groups with the herbivorous tribes, both 

 in the waters and on land, preserving among each other such 

 proportions as will maintain for ages an undisturbed harmony 

 in the creation. 



Again, we find animals and plants occurring in distinct 

 districts, unconnected with each other, in such ways that it 

 would seem almost impossible for either to migrate from any 

 point of their natural circle of distribution over its whole sur- 

 face. Have, for instance, such animals as are found identical 

 both in America and Europe been created either in Europe 

 or in America, and wandered from one of the continents over 

 to the other 1 Have those species which occur only in the 

 far north, and upon the higher smnmits of the Alps, been 

 created either in the Alps or in the north, and wandered from 

 one place to the other ? We are at a loss for substantial 

 arguments for believing that either one or the other place has 

 been the primitive location of such animals, or for denying 

 their simultaneous creation in both. 



Evidence could be accumulated to shew, we will not say 

 the improbability only, but even the impossibility, of supposing 

 that animals and plants were created in single pairs, and 

 assumed afterwards their present distribution. But the facts 

 mentioned will be sufficient to introduce our argument, and 

 from all we know of the laws of nature and of the distribu- 

 tion of animals, we conclude that they could neither originate 

 from a single pair, nor upon a single spot. And as for plants, 

 we would ask naturalists whether it were not superfluous to 

 create more than a single stalk of most plants, as vegetables, 

 with a few exceptions, may multiply extensively from a single 

 stem. But if it is granted that animals could not originate 

 from a single pair, nor upon a single spot, what is the more 

 natural view to take of the subject ? 



