ON THE METHOD OF ZADIG. M3 



therefore a legitimate function of astronomical science ; 

 and if it is legitimate for one science it is legitimate 

 for all ; the fundamental axiom on which it rests, the 

 constancy of the order of nature, being the common 

 foundation of all scientific thought. Indeed, if there 

 can be grades in legitimacy, certain branches of science 

 have the advantage over astronomy, in so far as their 

 retrospective prophecies are not only susceptible of veri- 

 fication, but are sometimes strikingly verified. 



Such a science exists in that application of the prin- 

 ciples of biology to the interpretation of the animal 

 and vegetable remains imbedded in the rocks which com- 

 pose the surface of the globe, which is called Palaeontology. 



At no very distant time, the question whether these 

 so-called "fossils" were really the remains of animals 

 and plants was hotly disputed. Very learned persons 

 maintained that they were nothing of the kind, but a 

 sort of concretion, or crystallisation, which had taken 

 place within the stone in which they are found; and 

 which simulated the forms of animal and vegetable life, 

 just as frost on a window-pane imitates vegetation. At 

 the present day, it would probably be impossible to find 

 any sane advocate of this opinion ; and the fact is rather 

 surprising, that among the people from whom the circle- 

 squarers, perpetual-motion ers, flat-earth men and the like, 

 are recruited, to say nothing of table-turners and spirit- 

 rappers, somebody has not perceived the easy avenue to 

 nonsensical notoriety open to any one who will take up 

 the good old doctrine, that fossils are all lusus nature. 



