628 HISTORY OF GEOLOGY. 



tation of the endowments of animals to their wants, 

 it is held that the endowments are the result of 

 the wants; that the swiftness of the antelope, 

 the claws and teeth of the lion, the trunk of the 

 elephant, the long neck of the giraffe, have been 

 produced by a certain plastic character in the con- 

 stitution of animals, operated upon, for a long course 

 of ages, by the attempts which these animals made 

 to attain objects which their previous organization 

 did not place within their reach. In this way, it is 

 maintained that the most striking attributes of ani- 

 mals, those which apparently imply most clearly the 

 providing skill of their Creator, have been brought 

 forth by the long-repeated efforts of the creatures 

 to attain the object of their desire ; thus animals 

 with the highest endowments have been gradually 

 developed from ancestral forms of the most limited 

 organization: thus fish, birds, and beasts, have 

 grown from small gelatinous bodies, " petits corps 

 gelatineux," possessing some obscure principle of 

 life, and the capacity of developement ; and thus 

 man himself, with all his intellectual and moral, as 

 well as physical privileges, has been derived from 

 some creature of the ape or baboon tribe, urged by 

 a constant tendency to improve, or at least to alter 

 his condition. 



As we have said, in order to arrive, even hypo- 

 thetically, at this result, it is necessary to assume, 

 besides a mere capacity for change, other positive 

 and active principles, some of which we may notice. 



