MAX AND THE FUTURE. 233 



types and models ; and, believing in the continuity of 

 natural law, we rely on the future adherence to the same 

 primal patterns. In fine, progressing as nature is, the life 

 of the Future must differ specifically from that of the Pre- 

 sent ; but, speaking in general terms, the difference cannot 

 be more than that we have traced between the life of the 

 successive epochs of geological history. 



In reasoning on the future aspects of vitality, we must 

 ever make allowance for the influence and operations of 

 MAN, who comes on the present stage of geological time as 

 a sub-creative power and new modifying agent. In the 

 olden epochs the laws of change acted solely through the 

 operations of purely physical agents, and what under their 

 control took ages to accomplish may now, under the 

 agency of man, be brought about within the scope of a 

 single century. To the materialism and mechanism of the 

 Past we now add the mentalism of the Present an emana- 

 tion " after God's own image," and a reasoning instrument 

 in the hands of the Creator to effect most important changes 

 on the vitality of the globe. The modifications brought 

 about by man in his onward progress are already remark- 

 able, though only the merest fraction of what they are 

 destined to be under the influences of increasing population 

 and higher civilisation. In his onward progress of cultiva- 

 tion, observe how many species of plants be destroys, and 

 how many new varieties he creates ; how by his drainage and 

 tillage he modifies soil and climate, making new conditions, 

 obnoxious and fatal to some races, and congenial to others ; 

 and how, in taking possession of new countries, he destroys 

 the carnivorous and dangerous animals, and substitutes the 

 domesticated in their stead extirpates the indigenous 

 flora, and plants in its place the vegetation of other regions ! 

 Mark what changes the white man has wrought, within the 

 last few centuries, on the life of the globe, in North and 



