INTRODUCTION. 5 



hension how the whole products of the universe could be brought to ma- 

 turity at the same season, or concentrated in the same spot. 



Their nature may he now infinitely modified. 



If all the animated subjects of the creation were framed as now ex- 

 isting of perishable matter, their durability was mere transience com- 

 pared with the lasting endurance of time. If resembling those where- 

 with the earth, the air, and the waters are now replete, can we presume 

 them exempt from the ravages of disease, deca}', and death. Therefore, 

 the whole being liable to sudden extirpation, might have left a fright- 

 ful void, to be replenished only by a new creation. 



But now did the Supreme Intelligence devise a marvellous expedient 

 to counteract the blight, and avert desolation. Animals were empowered 

 to reproduce themselves, to restore their own similitude in the production 

 of progeny. By this means is generation transmitted through genera- 

 tion, and at the latest moment the images of what existed at the date of 

 their creation are offered to our view. 



The regularity and simphcity whereby the world is in this manner 

 carried on, forms an impressive feature of the grandeur of the whole 

 design, though the minutias of such reproduction be still wi'apped in 

 m^'stery. 



By the general laws governing the perpetuation of Uving beings, 

 each is ordained to spring from two parents. But to this there are wide 

 and extraordinary exceptions. Frequently the progeny is derived from 

 only one, whereby it is nurtured through a previous state of imperfec- 

 tion until ushered into the world. Sometimes a portion of the single 

 parent separates spontaneously as a shapeless mass, which is slowly 

 refined into symmetrical form, with the development of all the oi'ganic 

 structure required for its exigencies, and necessary to present a perfect 

 image of the parent. 



The vegetable kingdom is multipUed through the medium of seeds, 

 and buds, or shoots, wherein appears a striking analogy to the processes 

 beheld in the multiplication of animals. 



Fleshy buds germinate from the surface of some of the humbler 

 creatures, either dropping off at a certain stage of their progress, or 



