UNIVERSALITY OP CREATIONAL PROGRESS. 305 



ward, to account for the plan of vital development ; some 

 physiological law for the general order of Life analogous to 

 that which governs the growth and development of the in- 

 dividual. The better, then, that we understand the physi- 

 ology of individual growth and varietal divergence the 

 fuller our knowledge of the palaeontological order and ascent 

 of vitality, the sooner will we be enabled to arrive at some 

 indication of this Law of progressional development. If 

 the teachings of geology are not a delusion, the fact of vital 

 progression on this globe is as certain as the succession of 

 its stratified formations. Science has already done much to 

 arrange and elucidate the one; may we not hope that under 

 the light of increasing knowledge and more philosophical 

 methods, human reason shall by-and-by attain to a satisfac- 

 tory explanation of the other 1 It is admitted that in course 

 of time, and under new conditions, plants and animals do 

 break into new varieties. Variation is thus merely a mat- 

 ter of time and continuance of condition. And if this be 

 admitted, we have only to discover in the respective species 

 those physiological peculiarities which give direction and 

 character to the new variations. Mysterious as the ordainings 

 of life may seem, the problem is manifestly bound up with 

 the operating forces of the universe, and as such is hope- 

 fully within the reach of science, as it is certainly within 

 its legitimate domain. All that we know of the growth, 

 reproduction, and decay of vitality are the results of physical 

 causation, which can be investigated and determined ; shall 

 we cease to believe that its development in time is similarly 

 produced and as capable of demonstration? 



The outcry that has been raised in certain quarters 

 against these hypotheses of vital development, is utterly 

 senseless and unworthy. Investigators perceive that cer- 

 tain plans pervade the vegetable and animal kingdoms, 

 and that the whole is inseparably associated in one vital 



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