80 THE STOBY OF THE EAETH AND MAN. 



and had prematurely become adult. Old forms are 

 often generalized, or less specific in their adaptations 

 than those of modern times. There is less division of 

 labour among them. Old forms sometimes not only 

 rise to the higher places in their groups, but usurp 

 attributes which in later times are restricted to their 

 betters. Old forms are often gigantic in size in com- 

 parison with their modern successors, which, if they 

 could look back on their predecessors, might say, 

 " There were giants in those days/' Some old forms 

 have gone onward in successive stages of elevation by 

 a regular and constant gradation. Others have re- 

 mained as they were through all the ages, Some have 

 no equals in their groups in modern days. All these 

 things speak of order, but of order along with develop- 

 ment, and this development not evolution ; unless by 

 this term we understand the emergence into material 

 facts of the plans of the creative mind. These plans 

 we may hope in some degree to understand, though we 

 may not be able to comprehend the mode of action of 

 creative power any more than the mode in which our 

 own thought and will act upon the machinery of 

 our own nerves. Still, the power is not the less real, 

 that we are ignorant of its mode of operation. The 

 wind bloweth whither it listeth, and we feel its 

 strength, though we may not be able to calculate the 

 wind of to-morrow or the winds of last year. So is the 

 Spirit of God when it breathes into animals the breath 

 of life, or the Almighty word when it says, " Let the 

 waters bring forth." 



