

OP A FORMER WORLD. 11 



on the eleventh day to 4,000,000, and on the twelfth day to 

 16,000,000 ; while, of another kind, Ehrenberg states that one 

 individual is capable of becoming, in four days, 170,000,- 

 000,000 ! To this distinguished naturalist we are indebted 

 for the developement of the fact that ages ago our world 

 was rife with these minute organisms, belonging to a great 

 number of species, whose mineralised skeletons actually con- 

 stitute nearly the whole mass of some tertiary soils and rocks 

 several feet in thickness, and extending over areas of many 

 acres. Such is the Polirschiefe7' } or polishing slate of Bilin 

 in Bohemia, which occupies a surface of great extent, proba- 

 bly the site of an ancient lake, and forms slaty strata of 

 fourteen fe'et in thickness, almost wholly composed of the 

 silicified shields of animalcules. The size of a single one, 

 forming the polishing slate, " amounts upon an average, and 

 in the greatest part, to TSJ of a line, which equals i of 

 the thickness of a human hair, reckoning its average 

 size at -fa of a line. The globule of the human blood 

 considered at yj-o is not much smaller. The blood glo- 

 bules of a frog are twice as large as one of these ani- 

 malcules. As the Polirschiefer of Bilin is slaty, but 

 without cavities, these animalcules lie closely compressed. 

 In round numbers, about 23 millions would make up a cubic 

 line, and would in fact be contained in it. There are 1728 

 cubic lines in a cubic inch; and therefore a cubic inch 

 would contain, on an average, about 41,000 millions of 

 these animals. On weighing a cubic inch of this mass, 

 I found it to be about 220 grains. Of the 41,000 millions 

 of animals 187 millions go to a grain ; or the siliceous 

 shield of each animalcule weighs about yfy millionth part of 

 a grain." Such is the statement of Ehrenberg, which natu- 

 rally suggests to the reflection of the French philosopher, 

 that if the Almighty is great in great things, he is-' still 

 more so in those which are minute ; and furnishes additional 

 data for the well-known moral argument of the theologian 



