152 KANTS UNIVERSAL NATURAL HISTORY 



creation has to exhibit in unlimited space throughout the 

 succession of eternity. 



It seems that this end which is to be the fate of the 

 worlds, as of all natural things, is subject to a certain 

 law whose consideration gives our theory a new feature 

 to recommend it. According to that law the heavenly 

 bodies that perish first, are those which are situated nearest 

 the centre of the universe, even as production and forma- 

 tion did begin near this centre ; and from that region 

 deterioration and destruction gradually spread to further 

 distances till they come to bury all the world that has 

 finished its period, through a gradual decline of its move- 

 ments, in a single chaos at last. On the other hand, Nature 

 unceasingly occupies herself at the opposite boundary of 

 the developed world, in forming worlds out of the raw 

 material of the scattered elements; and thus, while she 

 grows old on one side near the centre, she is young on 

 the other, and is fruitful in new productions. According 

 to this law the developed world is bounded in the middle 

 between the ruins of the nature that has been destroyed 

 and the chaos of the nature that is still unformed ; and 

 if we suppose, as is probable, that a world which has 

 already attained to perfection may last a longer time than 

 what it required to become formed, then, notwithstanding 

 all the devastations which the perishableness of things 

 incessantly brings about, the range of the universe will 

 still generally increase. 



But, finally, when admission is given to another idea 

 which is just as probably in accordance with the consti- 

 tution of the Divine works, the satisfaction which such a 

 delineation of the changes of nature excites, is raised to 

 the highest degree of complacency. Can we not believe 



