THE PUE- ADAMITE EARTH. 



described, and located on the earth's crust, above eighteen thousand 

 species of Mollusca and lladiata alone, have demonstrated that all 

 the species found in strata of the same date, with extremely rare 

 exceptions, are characteristic of these strata, being found there 

 exclusively, and in no other strata of anterior or posterior 

 deposition ; so that, instead of a few species only being cha- 

 racteristic, it would Appear that all the species are so, with 

 exceptions so rare as to be altogether insignificant. 



It appears, therefore, that on the crust of the earth there is a 

 sort of organic stratification, consisting of a series of superposed 

 layers of animal remains, each of which contains a distinct 

 collection of species, no two such layers having any species in 

 common, save in very rare and exceptional cases, and that even 

 these exceptions may be satisfactorily explained as arising from 

 accidental causes. 



250. Since twenty-nine such organic stages have been de- 

 termined, it must be inferred that during the geological period 

 corresponding to each of them, the earth was peopled by a 

 collection of animals which had no previous or subsequent 

 existence, and which constituted a distinct and independent 

 creation. This inference is fully confirmed by the fact, that on 

 comparing stage with stage, we do not find the successive faunas 

 passing one into the other by slow and imperceptible degrees ; but, 

 on the contrary, we find between those of every two successive 

 stages, a distinct and unmistakeable line of separation. In the 

 superior layers of each stage, the fauna peculiar to it totally dis- 

 appears, as though it were annihilated by some universally 

 destructive agency ; and it is not until we arrive at the lowest or 

 first layer of the succeeding stage, that the next fauna appears 

 not gradually and successively, but suddenly and simultaneously 

 over the whole extent of the globe, so far as geological observation 

 has extended, and everywhere, from the equator to the poles, the 

 same species are found in it. 



251. Hereupon two questions necessarily arise : What are the 

 physical causes which produced the total destruction of the fauna 

 of the inferior stage, and the creation of that of the superior ? To 

 the former a satisfactory answer is obtained, as we shall presently 

 show, by the geological convulsions, the devastating effects of 

 which have been already frequently noticed in these pages. But 

 when we seek the agency which twenty-nine times successively 

 called into existence a new animal kingdom to replace that which 

 was previously destroyed, we are compelled to acknowledge the 

 limits of our intellectual powers, and to prostrate ourselves in reve- 

 rence before that Omnipotence to whose agency alone these great 

 creative acts can be assigned. There are limits which the human 



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