] 76 THE RECENT. 



higher and higher forms, so the life of the future must 

 transcend that of the present, as the present excels the 

 past. Unless geology has altogether misinterpreted the 

 history of this earth, and her teachings be no better than a 

 fable and delusion, philosophy is chained to this conclusion. 

 Could we discover the terms of the law that has regulated 

 the evolutions of past vitality, we might approximate to 

 some idea of its future forms ; but, ignorant of these terms, 

 we can only rely on the upward progress of life, and believe 

 that its newer phases will retain the same appreciable rela- 

 tions to the present that the present does to the age that 

 immediately preceded. The great primal patterns radiate, 

 articulate, molluscan, and vertebrate will ever remain the 

 same : their modifications seem, endless, their adaptations 

 interminable. 



