The Beginning of Life 



and evolutionary growth thousands of different forms of 

 squirming creatures came into being. As the Algae devel- 

 oped into the fungus plants, the lichens, mosses and ferns, 

 so the single-celled animals developed into the many-celled 

 animals such as the corals, sponges, worms, brachiopods, 

 trilibites, etc., whose skeleton forms are now found as 

 fossils in the rocks which were once the floors of ancient 

 seas. Both plants and animals traveled the same road in 

 their development. The distinguishing characteristic between 

 the earliest forms of plant and animal life is that the plants 

 obtain their food from dead matter — from the soil direct 

 while the animals obtain their food from living bodies — 

 either plant or animal. Thus all animal life is dependent on 

 plant life for its existence. 



But Nature is always struggling for perfection. The 

 plants could go no further without a flower and seed and the 

 animals could make no further progress without a backbone. 



[i8i] 



