200 SKETCH OF THE LIFE AND ACHIEVEMENTS 



animal creation is the acquisition of the last 

 few centuries, not yet concluded, and capable 

 of a development whose limits we dare not 

 venture to guess. " The perpetual evolution 

 of active forces will, as Humboldt observed, 

 " bring us by a more profound research to the 

 gate of new labyrinths ; " but it is even this 

 multiplicity of untrodden and intertwined roads 

 which produces at each progressive step a 

 happy surprise. Each law revealed to the ob- 

 server leads to the conclusion that there is a 

 still higher law yet unknown ; for nature is, as 

 Carus, in his work, " The Original Parts of Bone 

 and Shell Skeletons," said, " for ever growing, 

 continually engaged in the process of formation 

 and development/' A progressive insight into 

 the law of evolution will deepen in us the con- 

 viction of the infinitude of life in nature ; we 

 shall perceive that upon the solid earth, in the 

 atmosphere by which it is surrounded ; in the 

 depth of the ocean, and the heavens high above, 

 the courageous explorer will, after the lapse of 

 thousands of years, still find immensity. The 

 recognition of the absolute necessary, the com- 

 prehension of cause and effect, and the yet un- 

 solved problem, " the knowledge of the natural 

 and necessary connection of all things and all 

 phenomena," is, according to Professor B. Cotta, 



