190 LIFE ON THE EARTH. 



peculiarities of development, and interesting evi- 

 dences of the manner in which the Divine Author 

 has been pleased to work, 



'The whole train of animated beings, from the 

 simplest and oldest up to the highest and most 

 recent, are thus to be regarded as a series of ad- 

 vances of the principle of development, which have 

 depended upon external physical circumstances to 

 which the resulting animals are appropriate. I con- 

 template the whole phenomena,' he says, 'as having 

 been in the first place arranged in the councils of 

 the Divine Wisdom, to take place, not only upon 

 this sphere, but upon all the others in space, under 

 necessary modifications, and as being carried on, 

 from first to last, here and elsewhere, under imme- 

 diate favour of the creative will or energy. We are 

 drawn to the supposition that the first step in the 

 creation of life upon this planet was a chemico- 

 electric operation, by which simple germinal vesicles 

 were produced' After this it is suggested, 'as an 

 hypothesis already countenanced by much that is 

 ascertained, and likely to be farther sanctioned by 

 much that remains to be known, that the first step 

 was an advance under favour of peculiar condi- 

 tions, from the simplest forms of being, to the next 

 more complicated, and this through the medium of 

 the ordinary process of generation' 



