THE PREPAKATION OF THE EARTH FOR MAn's ABODE. 101 



beings and the times at which they appeared. "We shall be pleased 

 to hear any one who would like to speak on the subject or to put 

 any questions to the author. 



The Secretary (Professor Hult, LL.D.). — Mr. Chairman, — At 

 my suggestion Professor Logan Lobley kindly undertook to deal 

 with the subject of his essay. It is one which, as it seems to me, 

 is eminently suited for the consideration of members of the Institute, 

 and I feel sure it will be allowed that it has been ably handled by 

 the author. 



It is one of the great triumphs of Science of the nineteenth 

 century, and of the Victorian Era, that it has witnessed the un- 

 folding of the Geological Record. For nearly eighteen centuries 

 of the Christian Era, not to speak of the many previous centuries, 

 mankind had no other guide to his knowledge of what we 

 may designate " the pre-Adamic history of the world and its 

 inhabitants " beyond that afforded by early chaptei'S of the Book 

 of Genesis. I am not here to disparage the geological record as 

 contained in that wonderful book, which I never read, or hear read, 

 without recognizing that it is far beyond what unassisted human 

 reason could have imagined, or produced at the time it was written. 

 It contains in simple and stately language the main outline of the 

 history of the world and of its inhabitants ; but it was left for 

 recent scientific investigation to fill in the details, and so complete 

 the record. That has been the great work of the nineteenth century ; 

 and the author has unfolded it to us this evening, briefly as was 

 necessary, but with sufficient fulness to enable us to recognize the 

 grand procession of vital phenomena — the development of animal 

 and plant life, of which the earth has been the theatre — from 

 the earliest dawn to the present period. 



The portion of the essay which will cause most interest is 

 probably that in which we approach the appearance of the animals 

 and plants now inhabiting the globe, and which ranges through 

 the Tertiary period. There we have the process of organic 

 evolution by which the forms more and more approximating to 

 those now inhabiting the world appeared in company with man 

 himself. It was a slow and gradual process, as are all the great 

 events of Providence in the affairs of the world ; in His plan for 

 the government of the world there must always be " the fulness 

 of time " ; and in the natural world we know that it is governed 

 according to the proverb '"''Natura nil facit per saltern.''^ Thus when 



