732 



sion-house, the earth, in its bearings on the ' conditions of existence,' 

 that not a few of our reasonings regarding the introduction and 

 extinction of species and genera must proceed." 



Reasoning upon the well-grounded supposition that the earth was 

 destined eventually to become the dwelling place of a being, " the 

 sum total of all animals, — the animal equivalent to the whole animal 

 kingdom," as Oken calls man, Mr. Miller well observes that the " defi- 

 nite period at which man was introduced upon the scene seems to 

 have been specially determined by the conditions of correspondence 

 which the phenomena of his habitation had at length come to assume 

 with the predestined constitution of his mind." This position he il- 

 lustrates by reference to the peculiar impression made upon the mind of 

 man by the occurrence of those now comparatively rare phenomena, 

 earthquakes. And after quoting from Humboldt and Tschudi their 

 graphic descriptions of the effects of earthquakes upon the human 

 mind, he thus continues : — 



" Now, a partially consolidated planet, tempested by frequent earth- 

 quakes, of such terrible potency, that those of the historic ages would 

 be but mere ripples of the earth's surface in comparison, could be no 

 proper home for a creature so constituted. The fish or reptile, — ani- 

 mals of a limited range of instinct, exceedingly tenacious of life in 

 most of their varieties, oviparous, prolific, and whose young immedi- 

 ately on their escape from the egg can provide for themselves, might 

 snjoy existence in such circumstances, to the full extent of their nar- 

 row capacities; and when sudden death fell upon them, — though 

 their remains, scattered over wide areas, continue to exhibit that dis- 

 tortion of posture incident to violent dissolution, which seems to 

 speak of terror and suffering, — we may safely conclude there was but 

 little real suffering in the case; they were happy up to a certain point, 

 and unconscious for ever after. Fishes and reptiles were the proper 

 inhabitants of our planet during the ages of the earth-tempests ; and 

 when, under the operation of the chemical laws, these had become 

 less frequent and terrible, the higher mammals were introduced. That 

 prolonged ages of these tempests did exist, and that they gradually 

 settled down, until the state of things became at length comparatively 

 fixed and stable/few geologists will be disposed to deny. The evidence 

 which supports this special theory of the development of our planet 

 in its capabilities as a scene of organized and sentient being, seems 

 palpable at every step. Look first at these grauwacke rocks; and, af- 

 ter marking how in one place the strata have been upturned on their 

 edges for miles together, and how in another the Plutonic rock has 



