4 



98 On the Changes of the Vegetable Kingdom 



of the globe becoming renewed many times since the period 

 when life first appeared upon it, under the influence of Crea- 

 tive Power. At each of these modifications — every time that 

 a great bed of mineral matter covered a portion of the earth's 

 surface, or a shaking of the crust of the globe winnkled this 

 surface, and produced new chains of mountains, the living 

 beings which inhabited our earth, destroyed and buried in 

 these sedimentary deposits, were replaced by a new creation 

 more or less different from the preceding. 



It would be a difficult task at this moment to fix precisely 

 the number of these successive creations of animals and 

 vegetables ; but science is every day leading us nearer to this 

 result, although it requires more detailed facts to enable us 

 to reach it. 



At certain epochs, however, great changes in the physical 

 state of our planet have been followed by modifications 

 equally great in the nature of the beings which inhabit it. 



These are the very decided changes which alone deserve 

 our attention in the present instance ; for, on the one hand, 

 they shew us each of the two oi'ganic kingdoms passing 

 through varied forms, of v/hich the different degrees are of 

 great interest, owing to the remarkable order in which they 

 succeed each other ; and, on the other, the nature of the 

 beings which correspond to each of these great geological 

 periods, may afford us most valuable indications respecting 

 the physical state of the earth, and its climate, at these dif- 

 ferent epochs, illustrative of the history of the formation of 

 our globe. 



From the most remote historical times, the vegetables 

 inhabiting our globe have undergone no change. This is 

 proved by the compai'ison of grains and plants preserved 

 in the tombs of Egypt, with those which now grow in that 

 country. 



On the contrary, the plants of the latest geological periods, 

 — those which occupied the eai'th before the last revolution of 

 its surface, and whose remains are enclosed in the deposits 

 named tertiary formations, — differ very considerably from such 

 as now grow in these same places. They are, in general, species 

 no longer existing in a living state, and their differences, re- 



