76 , HOMO V. DARWIN. 



snare in connection with this matter, it has been laid by Mr 

 Darwin's own hand. He has allowed himself to become so 

 enamoured of the venerable pair of hairy quadrupeds, with 

 tails and pointed ears, from whom he thinks himself de- 

 scended, that he skips over mountains more impassable 

 than the Himalayas, and flies on the wings of imagination 

 across separating and unfathomable abysses, that he may 

 embrace them. 



Lord C. Mr. Darwin is more probably carried away by 

 fondness for his hypothesis. He would like to find that all 

 animated existence has been developed from some primal 

 form, and that there is thus a grand unity in nature. Now, 

 there is doubtless unity in nature, but it is worthy of con- 

 sideration whether it does not lie deeper than Mr. Darwin 

 seeks it ; — not in all kinds of creatures having been de- 

 veloped from one primal form, but in all of them having 

 derived existence from one common source, that is, from 

 God Himself. An over-anxious desire to find unity else- 

 where than in the Creator, may become a source of error. 

 One may thus be led to imagine there is unity where there 

 is none, and to seek it where it cannot be found. I shall 

 be glad to hear, at our next sitting, what Mr. Darwin has 

 to say as to the way in which man, or rather the progenitors 

 of man, became erect. How did the ape-like creature ac- 

 quire a human-like posture ? 



