CHAP. XXIV. TRANSMUTATION AND NATURAL THEOLOGY. 505 



successively introduced not only higher and higher forms and 

 grades of intellect, but at a much remoter period may have 

 cleared at one bound the space which separated the highest 

 stage of the unprogressive intelligence of the inferior animals 

 from the first and lowest form of improvable reason mani- 

 fested by Man. 



To say that such leaps constitute no interruption to the 

 ordinary course of nature, is more than we are warranted in 

 affirming. In the case of the occasional birth of an indivi- 

 dual of superior genius, there is certainly no break in the 

 regular genealogical succession; and when all the mists of 

 mythological fiction are dispelled by historical criticism, 

 when it is acknowledged that the earth did not tremble at 

 the nativity of the gifted infant, and that the face of heaven 

 was not full of fiery shapes, still a mighty mystery remains 

 unexplained, and it is the order of the phenomena, and not 

 their cause, which we are able to refer to the usual course of 

 nature. 



Dr. Asa Gray, in the excellent essay already cited (p. 502), 

 has pointed out that there is no tendency in the doctrine of 

 Variation and Natural Selection to weaken the foundations of 

 Natm-al Theology ; for, consistently with the derivative hypo- 

 thesis of species, we may hold any of the popular views 

 respecting the manner in which the changes of the natural 

 world are brought about. We may imagine "that events and 

 operations in general go on in virtue simply of forces commu- 

 nicated at the first, and without any subsequent interference, 

 or we may hold that now and then, and only now and then, 

 there is a direct interposition of the Deity; or, lastly, we may 

 suppose that all the changes are carried on by the immediate 

 orderly and constant, however infinitely diversified, action of 

 the intelligent, efficient Cause." They who maintain that the 

 origin of an individual, as well as the origin of a species or 



