MARS ASTEROIDS JUPITER SATURN URANUS. 107 



no more ; plants and flowers would be unable to circulate their juices ; and man himself 

 would sink down to the level of a slow-moving quadruped like the sloth. There is thus 

 with us an express adaptation of the varieties of living existence to the magnitude and 

 circumstances of our globe ; and it is philosophical to accept this fact as a guarantee that 

 a similar adjustment obtains throughout the system with which we are connected. And 

 whence this adjustment ? Whence this marvellous proportioning of the power of the 

 humble crocus peeping above the snow, and the magnificent rein-deer bounding across 

 it, to the earth's volume and mass, so that the force of gravity is not too strong in the one 

 case for the development of the flower, nor muscular energy too great in the other for 

 the purposes of the animal ? Epicurus, upon reading the well-known lines of Hesiod in 

 his youth 



" Eldest of beings, Chaos first arose, 



Thence Earth wide-stretch'd, the steadfast seat of all 



The Immortals, 



is said to have proposed the natural question to his preceptor, " And Chaos whence ? " 

 The philosopher originated a theory in his riper years which assigned the creation to a 

 fortuitous concourse of atoms ; but how natural the inquiry, overlooked by the theory, 

 " And atoms whence ? " A sober understanding will not stop short of recognising a 

 presiding Providence in adapting the economy of terrestrial life to terrestrial conditions ; 

 and even so are we warranted, from the evidence of what is near, to look upon the 

 remote, as the scene of similar adaptations, the operation of the same First Cause. 



In regarding the planetary worlds as the abodes of sentient life and of forms of existence 

 kindred to those which occupy the earth, we are in advance of what is written, or what 

 observation detects, but not beyond what the sobrieties of reason will justify. It may be 

 hard to imagine how life can be sustained under the apparent heat of Mercury, or amid 

 the seeming cold, the tremendous storms, and rapid atmospheric changes of Jupiter. But, 

 ignorant of facts, a parallel difficulty would be a stumbling-block to us, in relation to our 

 own planet, when we consider the high temperature of its equatorial regions and the intense 

 cold of its polar circles. Yet we have great families of men and animals in each extreme. 

 We meet with human life upon the sultry plains of Delhi, and on the ice-bound shores of 

 Greenland ; and where the citron, the myrtle, and the palm will not flourish, the pines, the 

 mosses, and the lichens grow. It is impossible to naturalise the elk in England, owing to 

 its warmth ; and turn the giraffe adrift, and how long would it survive the chill of the 

 climate ? Yet each animal, in circumstances to which it is adapted, is stately and vigor- 

 ous. All the planets are plainly of one family as to their physical character, their 

 general configuration, their motions of revolution and rotation, and the alternation of 

 day and night ; and these are resemblances which may reasonably lead us to suspect 

 other analogies. The fact is also clear, of Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn 

 being surrounded with atmospheres; a constitution which strongly indicates their occu- 

 pancy with some varieties of organised being. We know, in the case of our own globe, 

 the important uses of its atmosphere in maintaining animal life, transmitting sound and 

 light, and in advancing the arts which tend to civilise society. Without such a gaseous 

 envelope, bound inseparably around the earth, its partner in all its motions, yet no ema- 

 nation from it, but a separate element, the ear would have no office to perform, the 

 tongue would be speechless, and the service of the eye be greatly abridged. The song of 

 birds, the hymns of religion, the eloquence of senates, and the utterance of relative kind- 

 ness would perish. The fiercest waves would dash in sullen silence upon the strand ; 

 and mankind would have no medium of inter-communication beyond that of sign and 

 gesture. We may well believe, therefore, that our world has been furnished with this 

 elastic and essential apparatus, in order to adapt it for the reception of animal existence 



