CHAPTEE XII. 



COURSE OF DEVELOPMENT ON THE EARTH. 



" Heaven has connexion with other worlds. Its inhabitants are God's 

 messengers through the creation. ... In the progress of their 

 endless being, they may have the care of other worlds." 



ClIANNING. 



FESTUS. Hath space no limit ? 

 LUCIFER. None to thee. Yet if 



Infinite, it would equal God, and that 



To think of is most vain. 



BAILEY'S Festus. 



ORGANIC life on the earth has passed through a 

 great series of changes, some very gradual, and 

 others perhaps more rapid ; but at each era 

 some natural group has attained its maximum of 

 development in numbers, size, and importance, 

 and has then dwindled into comparative insig- 

 nificance, to be first equalled and then surpassed 

 by some higher group which was passing through 

 its preliminary stages at the period when the 

 other was dominant. Yet the fundamental re- 

 semblance combined with infinite diversity which 

 we can trace not only throughout all existing, 

 but throughout all fossil nature also, is not only 



