GATS CONSISTENT WITH CONTINUOUS LIFE. 349 



for a century before any of them were disclosed. If now, 

 some millions of years hence, the Atlantic-Led should be 

 raised, and estuary or shore deposits laid upon it, these de 

 posits would contain remains of a Flora and Fauna so dis 

 tinct from everything below them, as to appear like a new 

 creation. 



Thus, along with continuity of life on the Earth s sur 

 face, there not only may be, but there must be, great gaps, 

 in the series of fossils ; and hence these gaps are no evi 

 dence against the doctrine of Evolution. 



One other current assumption remains to be criticized ; 

 and it is the one on which, more than on any other, de 

 pends the view taken respecting the question of develop 

 ment. 



From the beginning of the controversy, the arguments 

 for and against have turned upon the evidence of progres 

 sion in organic forms, found in the ascending scries of our 

 sedimentary formations. On the one hand, those who con 

 tend that higher organisms have been evolved out of low 

 er, joined with those who contend that successively higher 

 organisms have been created at successively later periods, 

 appeal for proof to the facts of Palaeontology ; which, they 

 say, countenance their views. On the other hand, theUni- 

 formitarians, who not only reject the hypothesis of devel 

 opment, but deny that the modern forms of life are higher 

 than the ancient ones, reply that the Pala3ontological evi 

 dence is at present very incomplete ; that though we have 

 not yet found remains of highly-organized, creatures in 

 strata of the greatest antiquity, we must not assume that 

 no such creatures existed when those strata were deposited ; 

 fiiid that, probably, geological research will eventually dis 

 close them. 



It must be admitted that thus far, the evidence has 

 gone in favoui of the latter party. Geological discovery 



