No. 144.] 529 



a refined condition. The same may be said of the ancient hyena, 

 whose bones occupy the hyena caves of England, but which does 

 not now exist, the animal of the same name being many times 

 less in size. We find the same true of many of the Saurians, and 

 while the tooth of the largest shark of this time is but an inch 

 high, we find the teeth of antique sharks in the Monmouth marls 

 larger than a human hand. May it not be that as the vegetable 

 kingdom progressed, it ceased to present food sufficiently gross 

 for the use of these animals, wliile those of finer ultimate struc- 

 ture, composed of more progressed particles, were able to assimi- 

 late more progressed food, and thus the useful animals, man in- 

 cluded, have all improved. 



In the fruits, vegetables, &c., we know this to be true; for we 

 have hundreds of varieties of pears alone which were unknown to 

 our forefathers, and in a greater or less degree we find similar ad- 

 vancement throughout the vegetable world. 



May not this principle of nature be equally true in the deve- 

 lopment of the observant faculties, and consequent ability to ex- 

 amine nature's laws? If the brain be indeed the seat of reason, 

 and its particles be more progressed than those which formed the 

 brain of men and animals long since, why may not the functions 

 be increased in the same ratio? To say that Confucius, Newton, 

 and others, were examples of the past, fully equal to any at the 

 present day, is to admit, that but few exceptions existed, and such, 

 exceptions are to be presented against all rules ; but the great 

 average mass of nature seems to have followed this law, and a 

 close observance of this truth, if found to be such, would enable 

 the physician to select the materials composing his medicines, 

 from that portion of advanced nature, which would furnish the 

 ultimates at the proper degree of progression. 



The farmer might also learn, that both his soil and the fertili- 

 zers used, have certain power consequent upon their advanced 

 state, and when used for raising the most progressed species of 

 plants, it may be necessary to select the most progressed kind of 

 fertilizers, or those containing ultimates which have for the longest 

 time, and during the greatest number of changes, occupied organic 



[Assembly, No. 144. | H 2 



