46 LIFE ON THE EARTH. 



culated whole; the parts co-ordinated; the condi- 

 tions adjusted; the origin defined; and a long du- 

 ration secured. Looking at it in this aspect we may 

 conceive it to be all of one age the result of one 

 act of power and wisdom, the expression of one 

 will at one epoch of time, and in this sense employ 

 for the whole the term, Creation, which admits of 

 no explanation in human language, because it refers 

 to an act of God's power, transcending all human 

 thought and experience. 



How completely the life of to-day represents the 

 life of the earliest historic times, in the same coun- 

 tries, may be ascertained by the slightest examina- 

 tion of the books, sculptures and buried skeletons, 

 which speak of those times. The Swallows, whose 

 twittering disturbed Anacreon, still break the slum- 

 bers of the luxurious poets of our day, and still ex- 

 cite the wonder of naturalists by their long flight to 

 Memphis 1 ; the Ibis still wanders by Egyptian rivers; 

 Philomela still charms us with her song of love; 

 still clang the Cranes, and soar aloft the Eagles; 

 still dance in air the summer-loving Flies as in the 

 days of Homer; and still the Polypus and Sponge, 

 and all the inhabitants of the sea, exhibit in the 

 Mediterranean the peculiar properties noticed in 

 them by Aristotle. Various as are the races of 

 1 Anac. 12. 33, 



