459 



that this apparent deficiency of power and judgment is a remark- 

 able instance of the wisest adaptation of means to the producing 

 of a most important end. For when it is cosidered, that the domi- 

 nion of the earth is given to a being, endued with peculiar faculties, 

 the preservation and improvement of which depend on their due 

 exercise, it surely is not discordant with the correctest ideas of an 

 arrangement, proceeding from consummate wisdom, and unlimited 

 power, thus to furnish that being with materials on which his abili- 

 ties may be employed. 



On examining those vegetable remains which still displayed some 

 traces of their original forms, appearances were discovered, which 

 seemed to point out a great dissimilarity between some of the vege- 

 tables of the former, and of the present world. So great did this 

 dissimilarity appear, as to warrant the conclusion, that either many 

 genera and species of vegetables, which existed in the former world, 

 are now entirely lost, or remain secreted from us in some remote, and 

 hitherto unexplored part of the world. Reasoning by analogy, from 

 the undoubted loss of several species, and even genera of animals, 

 we are led to consider the loss of a part of the vegetable creation 

 as far from improbable. This is a point which cannot, however, 

 be said to be determined, whilst any part of the world, in which 

 they may be concealed, has escaped the examination of the bota- 

 nist ; especially as some very good and learned men have regarded 

 the loss of a single link, in the chain of creation, as inadmissible ; it 

 implying, they say, such a deviation from the first plan of creation, 

 as might be attributed to a failure in the original design. But such 

 an inference does by no means follow ; since that plan, which pre- 

 vents the failure of a genus, or species from disturbing the general 

 arrangement, and economy, of the system, must manifest as great a 

 display of wisdom and power, as could any fancied chain of beings, 



