144 NATURAL HISTORY OF CREATION. 



did take place, there is this to be said, that in Mr. Weekes's 

 experiment, every care that ingenuity could devise was 

 taken to exclude the possibility of a development of the 

 insects from ova. The wood of the frame was baked in a 

 powerful heat ; a bell-shaped glass covered the apparatus, 

 and from this the atmosphere was excluded by the con- 

 stantly rising fumes from the liquid, for the emission of 

 which thei'e was an aperture so arranged at the top of 

 the glass, that only these fumes could pass. The water 

 was distilled, and the substance of the silicate had been 

 subjected to white heat. Thus every source of fallacy 

 seemed to be shut up. In such circumstances, a candid 

 mind, which sees nothing either impious or unphilo- 

 sophical in the idea of a new creation, will be disposed to 

 think that there is less difficulty in believing in such a 

 creation having actually taken place, than in believing 

 that, in two instances, separated in place and time, 

 exactly the same insects should have chanced to arise 

 from concealed o^^a, and these a species heretofore un- 

 known. 



