24 UNITY OF THE CREATIVE POWER. 



to those elements and actions through which the 

 various forms of organic life come into being, and 

 severally fulfil the conditions of their existence. The 

 typical characters so strongly marked in this great 

 scheme, equally among existing and fossil forms, show 

 a common power and intention pervading the whole. 

 The mutual adaptations, uses, and instincts of animal 

 life more especially, and the relations of this life to 

 the varying conditions of the outer world, all enforce 

 the same conclusion. It is not enfeebled by the doubts 

 now thrown on the origin and perpetuity of species. 

 If these be evolved, not by specific acts of creation, 

 but by successive changes from a few primitive types, 

 the argument still stands good for a single original 

 power, endowing organic life with that capacity for 

 progressive change which science is now seeking to 

 explore. 



Neither does the mixture of seeming ills and im- 

 perfections in animal life on the earth annul the 

 conclusion at which we arrive. The good and the 

 evil, taking our imperfect judgment of what belongs 

 to these names, are closely interwoven in the same 

 work whether from an unknown necessity, or from 

 mere contingency, or from some unseen higher pur- 

 pose, no natural philosophy has yet fully explained. 

 The question, in fact, merges in the higher one of the 

 Origin of Evil in the world that problem which 

 has perplexed the wisest and most devout minds in all 

 ages. But whatever view be taken of it, we need not 

 recur to any Manichgean doctrine of an antagonistic 

 power to meet the difficulty. The argument we have 



