THE ORIGIN OF SPECIES. 5 



'T^HROUGHOUT this volume we have felt considerable in- 

 convenience from the adopted dogmatical classification of 

 plants, and have all along been floundering between species and 

 variety, which certainly under culture soften into each other. 



A particular conformity, each after its own kind, when in a 

 state of nature termed species, no doubt ex^ts to a considerable 

 degree. This conformity has existed during the last forty cen- 

 turies. 



Geologists discover a like particular conformity — fossil species 

 — through the deep deposition of each great epoch ; but they 

 also discover an almost, complete difference to exist between 

 the species, or stamp of life, of one epoch, from that of every 

 other. We are therefore led to admit either of a repeated mira- 

 culous creation, or of a power of change, under a change of cir- 

 cumstances, to belong to living organized matter, or rather to 

 the congeries of inferior life, which appears to form superior. 

 The derangements and changes in organized existence induced 

 by a change of circumstances from the interference of man, af- 

 fording us proof of the plastic quality of superior life, and the 

 likelihood that circumstances have been very different in the 

 different epochs, though steady in each, tend strongly to heighten 

 the probability of the latter theory. 



When we view the immense calcareous and bituminous for- 

 mations, principally from the waters and atmosphere, and con- 

 sider the oxidations and depositions which have taken place, 

 either gradually or during some of the great convulsions, it ap- 

 pears at least probable that the liquid elements containing life 



*To all who have read (and who has not?) Mr. Darwin's work on the "Origin 

 of Species" this essay (which is mentioned in the " Origin of Species"), extracted 

 from the appendix to Patrick Matthew's work on " Naval Timber" (1831— Lon- 

 don : Longman. Rees, and Co. ; Edinburgh : Adam Black ,) and communicated 

 to our columns by Mr. N. A. Dalzell, will, we think, possess considerable interest. 



