BT THE PRESIDENT. 87 



" Evoiy individual tree produces iunumorablc seeds, and every 

 individual lish innumerable spawn, in such inconceivable abundance 

 as would in a short space of time crowd the earth and ocean with 

 inhabitants." Hence the strusi;gle for existence. 



" The idea of the reproduction of animals from a single living 

 filament of their fathers, appears to have been shadowed or allego- 

 rized in the curious account in sacred writ of the formation of Eve 

 from a rib of Adam." 



*' From this account of reproduction, it appears that all animals 

 have a similar origin, viz. fi'om a single living filament ; and that 

 the difference of their forms and qualities has arisen only from the 

 different irritabilities and sensibilities, or voluntarities, or associa. 

 bilities, of this original living filament ; and perhaps in some degree 

 from the different forms of the particles of the fluids by which it 

 has been at first stimulated into activity ; and that from hence, as 

 Linnseus has conjectured in respect to the vegetable world, it is 

 not impossible but the great variety of species of animals, which 

 now tenant the earth, may have had their origin from the mixture 

 of a few natural orders." 



" Considering the great changes naturally produced in animals 

 after their birth, as the butterfiy from the caterpillar, the frog from 

 the tadpole, and even in mankind from youth to maturity ; the 

 great changes introduced into various animals by artificial or acci- 

 dental cultivation, as in horses, dogs, cattle, camels, sheep, rabbits, 

 or pigeons ; as well as in monstrosities, which are propagated and 

 continued ; and the great similai'ity of structure which obtains in 

 all warm-blooded animals, including man, one is led to conclude 

 that they have been alike produced from a similar living filament." 

 " From thus meditating ou the great similarity of the structure 

 of the warm-blooded animals, and at the same time of the great 

 changes they undergo both before and after their nativity ; and by 

 considering in how minute a portion of time many of the changes 

 of animals above described have been produced, would it be too 

 bold to imagine, that in the great length of time since the earth 

 began to exist, perhaps millions of ages before the commencement 

 of the history of mankind, would it be too bold to imagine that all 

 warm-blooded animals have arisen from one living filament which 

 the Great First Cause endued with animality, with the power of 

 acquiring new parts, attended with new propensities, directed by 

 irritations, sensations, volitions, and associations ; and thus possessing 

 the faculty of continuing to improve by its own inherent activity, 

 and of delivering down those improvements by generation to its 

 posterity, world without end." 



