176 EXTINCT MONSTERS. 



pageant, a still higher order of privilege is vouchsafed to us. 

 We have only to light the torch of philosophy, to seize the clue 

 of induction, and, like the Prophet Ezekiel in the vision, to pro- 

 ceed into the valley of death, when the graves open before us 

 and render forth their contents ; the dry and fragmented bones 

 run together, each bone to his bone ; the sinews are laid over, 

 the flesh is brought on, the skin covers all, and the past existence 

 — to the mind's eye — starts again into being, decked out in all the 

 lineaments of life. ' He who calls that which hath vanished 

 back again into being, enjoys a bliss like that of creating.' Such 

 were the words of the philosophical Niebuhr, when attempting 

 to fill up the blanks in the fragmentary records of the ancient 

 Romans, whose period in relation to past time dates but as of 

 yesterday. How much more highly privileged, then, are we, who 

 can recall, as it were, the beings of countless remote ages, when 

 man was not yet dreamed of! not only this, but if we use 

 discreetly the lights which have been given to us, we may invoke 

 the spirit of the winds, and learn how they were tempered to suit 

 the natures of these extinct beings." 



