O4 EVOLUTION OF LIFE. 



or secondary causes, which consist in the va- 

 rious organs of the body, as the instruments 

 which it employs, in order to assist ; as a tele- 

 scope to the eye, a hammer to the hand, &c. 



It is with a view to make the end subservient 

 to the means, of adapting the medium to the 

 nature of the being which it is to contain, to 

 produce, in fact, harmony and adaptation be-J 

 tween both, that the providence of God has 

 destined particular soils, and particular cli- 

 mates, for particular classes of beings in which 

 those ends may be attained. When we behold 

 the regularity with which the actions of vegeta- 

 bles are performed, as well as the simplicity in 

 the construction of their frame,- we are natu- 

 rally led to conclude, that those actions, con- 

 stant and definite as they seem to be, must flow 

 from the operation of causes which exist uni- 

 formly and invariably the same, without any 

 opposing or controling power ; residing within 

 the system itself, by the energy of which those 

 actions can either be suppressed, or prevented : 

 there is not only a progressive development of 

 particular organs, from the first period of ger- 

 mination, to the perfection of fructification ; 

 but an appointed season for the evolution of the 

 living principle itself, which the seed con- 

 tains ; the end, of which seems evidently to be 

 the, propagation of the species, as the means of 

 affording nourishment and support to beings of a 

 higher class. 



