THE FUNCTIONS OF LIFE. 51 



All these apparent anomalies and gradations of structure 

 tend still farther to demonstrate the generality of the plans 

 of nature, and the comprehensiveness of her design, which 

 embraces the whole series of animated beings. These views 

 are strongly corroborated by the discoveries that are con- 

 tinually being made of species now no longer in existence, 

 but which, in former ages of the world, helped to fill up 

 many of the chasms which now interrupt the continuity of 

 that series. This knowledge has been revealed to us by the 

 examination of their fossil remains, those monuments of 

 former epochs, which have thrown such important light on 

 the most interesting questions in Geology as well as in Phy- 

 siology. ^ 



The notion has long prevailed that the beings composing 

 the vegetable and animal kingdoms, might, if we were 

 thoroughly acquainted with their structure and economy, be 

 arranged in a linear series, commencing with the simplest 

 and regularly ascending to the most refined and complicated 

 organizations, till it reached its highest point in man, who is 

 unquestionably placed at the summit of the scale. Bonnet, 

 in-particular, cherished with enthusiastic ardour the hypo- 

 thesis that all organic beings formed a continuous gradation, 

 each member of which, like the successive links of a chain, 

 was connected with that which preceded, and with that 

 which followed it; and he pursued this idea by appljdng it 

 even to the productions of the mineral world. But, divest- 

 ing ourselves of these hypothetical views and figurative 

 images, we find, on sober observation, that instead of one 

 continuous series, we are presented with only detached frag- 

 ments and interrupted portions of this imaginary system: so 

 that, if, for the sake of illustration, we must employ a me- 

 taphor, the natural distribution of animals would appear to 

 be represented, not by a chain, but by complicated net- 

 work, where several parallel series are joined by transverse 

 and oblique lines of connexion. A multitude of facts, how- 

 ever, tend to show that the real types or models of struc- 

 ture, are more correctly represented by circular or recurring 



