146 THB ORIGIN OP CREATION. 



On examining the substance, it was observed to be covered 

 with small insects, and scientific men, without much thought, 

 or close research, at once assumed that they built the coral. 



Commencing at the bottom of the ocean, we were told, these 

 industrious insects struggled higher and higher from their vast 

 lurid sea green depths, towards the light, until they reached the 

 surface, when, with a devotion worthy of a higher phase of 

 being, they sealed the work with their own bodies, thus making 

 it their tomb, as well as their monument. Later discoveries 

 have proved this to be contrary to fact. Chambers Encyclopedia 

 tells us it has been ascertained, that none of the polypes, or 

 coral insects, live at depths of more than twenty or thirty 

 fathoms; and that most of them are inhabitants of much 

 shallower water. As coral is found at much lower depths than 

 this, the question arises -what formed it at the bottom of the 

 ocean ? 



During the cruise of H. M. S. Challenger, a piece of coral was 

 brought up from a depth of a mile and a half > and in the news- 

 papers it was stated to be, unfortunately dead. If by this it 

 was meant that no coral insects were found in it, then we have 

 evidence that our view of its formation is correct, viz; by 

 semi-mineral growth. 



Every one has probably seen coral. It is generally in the 

 form of a tree, with branches ; or it is of a circular form, like a 

 sponge, with the appearance of having all sprung from a centre, 

 On the Isthmus of Panama we saw a large solid piece that 

 looked like the trunk of a tree, and on breaking it, we found 

 the formation to radiate from an innumerable series of centres, 

 the whole filled up with an interlacing of stars. The construc- 

 tion was such that it could not have been built by insects, for 



