32 EVOL UTION AXD NA TURAL THEOL OGY. 



cannot often be expected to fall under human 

 observation at all. It is however, tolerably well 

 established that the various worlds which are 

 scattered through space, run through a certain 

 course of development, and perhaps also of de- 

 struction. The laws of Energy clearly indicate 

 that the universe is not eternally stable, and 

 that it cannot exist for ever in its present form. 

 But all analogy, even if scientific data are at 

 present wanting, will justify us in assuming that 

 its dissolution would be merely a prelude to a 

 yet grander future development. The history 

 of the earth, as a whole, furnishes us with no 

 instance of a retrograde movement ; and our 

 knowledge of its past is necessarily incompar- 

 ably greater than of that of any other world. 



Herbert Spencer believes that the Universe, in 

 whole or in part, is continually passing from a 

 nebular or an amorphous, to an organised state, 

 and vice rersd. But we are not justified in 

 believing that these changes are " Kalpas," 

 during which, every event of previous cycles 

 repeats itself over and over again ; and all our 

 knowledge is opposed to a speculation, which 

 would reduce the System of the Universe to a 

 recurring decimal. 



