RAXiWCTLACEyE. 671 



They are also supposed to stimulate the secretion of milk, and are mixed in curry or 

 adiiiiriistcred to nursiug mothers with that object, and they enter into the composition 

 of chutnies. 



DKLPniXIUM. • 



Petals small, 2-1, the two upper prolonged into a pointed spur. 

 *D. Ajacis. Cultivated. 



Larkspur. 



Having now completed the review (so far as the imperfect record in the foregoing 

 pages deserves the uuine) of the plants and animals of Burma, nothing remains for the 

 Editor save to close Ids labours with an exi)ression of the strong testimony which, in 

 his opinion, the contemplation of the works of Xature bears to the presence through- 

 out of Providential design. Theology has been too much discredited, and rightly, by 

 the well-meant and sincere, but not the less absurd and misdirected efforts of school- 

 men, to elucidate the mystery of the unseen and declare the laws and principles of the 

 universe, in accordance with their own preconceived views of the fitness of things. In 

 the hands even of a Milton, and as an avowed eflort of the imagination, this tampering 

 with the impenetrable mystery of being, with the result of making " God the Pather 

 turn a School divine," is at the present day somewhat of a pitiable spectacle, but 

 when pressed further, and identified with a dogmatic assertion of spiritual truth, 

 becomes offensive and (using the phrase in its proper sense) blasphemous — " Who 

 is this that darkencth counsel by words without knowledge?" Job. xxxviii. 2. 



With a wider knowledge of Nature than was possessed by schoolmen of this 

 class, came a reaction against all confident assertions of the relation of man to the 

 universe, resulting in that form of ' agnosticism,' which those of the ' old religion ' 

 characterize by a harsher and more opprobrious term. Here the study of Xature 

 comes in as a corrective, just as the mcdiieval conception of a camel, as it was 

 presumed to be, stands corrected by our knowledge of a camel, as we find that it 

 now-a-days is ; and whilst admitting that there are some subjects, which, even in 

 their physical relations, such, for example, as matter and space, we must admit to 

 be beyond the grasp of the human mind, yet that same mind, limited as its powers 

 are in particular directions, nevertheless compels us to admit that uU we see around 

 us is not the result of blind chance. In the very existence of the creature, 

 an ' agnostic ' may read in signs not to be misunderstood the antecedent interference 

 of a Creator, and without attemptiug to fathom what by us is unfathomable, we are 

 compelled to own that inanimate nature teaches a no less significant lesson than does 

 the animate world, whereof we ourselves are a part, of the power, glory, and per- 

 vading presence of the unseen Author of all. 



Sol qualis nitoat, quali sit origine natus. 



Indicia, assiduo dum redit orbe, facit ; 

 Per quascumque vagum late jubar extulit eras, 



Sedulus Aititiccm prxdicat iUe suum. 



Cum modo victrices descondunt Vesperis umbrae, 



Exci])it alternam luna diserta vicem ; 

 Et sua miranti memorans primordia terra;, 



Edita quo fundat lumina forte, refert. 



lUius irtherium quot servant sidera cursum, 



Quot gyri in coulo, noctivagajque faces, 

 Singula confirmant cantu, qua) singula narrant 



Et capit unanimes axis uterque modes. 



Psalm xi.\-, W. G. Humphrey, Arundtnes Carm. p. 34-5. 



