S30 FIRST pniNCIPLES OF NATURAL CLASSIFICATION. 



wanting. The question then arises^ upon what grounds 

 do we contend that such are natural groups, seeing that 

 their circularity cannot be traced ? This leads us to 

 consider the diflferent relations which belong to every 

 organised being, and to the developement of another law 

 of nature, — both of which are now to be explained. 



(282.) We are thus conducted to our third pro- 

 position. The contents of every circular group are 

 symbolically or analogically represented by the contents 

 of every other circle in the animal kingdom. There are, 

 in nature, two sorts of resemblances, which are termed 

 analogy and affinity. We have so fully explained these 

 relations in our preliminary volume *, that it is only in 

 consequence of our wish to exhibit in a connected series 

 all the laws of natural arrangement yet discovered, that 

 we now repeat, in some measure, the substance of what 

 has already been stated. 



(283.) The most ordinary observer perceives, that 

 every created being has different degrees of relationship 

 or of resemblance to others. Where this is immediate, 

 it is termed an affinity ; where, on the other hand, it is 

 remote, it is a relation of analogy.^ 



(284.) The theoretic distinction between affinity and 

 analogy, in a more scientific point of view, has been 

 thus stated by the naturalist who first gave a definite 

 meaning to the terms: — " Suppose the existence of two 

 parallel series of animals, the corresponding points of 

 which agree in some one or two remarkable particulars 

 of structure. Suppose, also, that the general conform- 

 ation of the animals in each series passes so gradually, 

 from one species to the other, as to render any inter- 

 ruption of their transition almost imperceptible. We 

 shall thus have two very different relations, which must 



» Preliminary Discourse on Nat. Hist. 



t There cannot be a better proof of the low ebb to which the higher de- 

 partments of zoology have sunk, and the ignorance of those persons who 

 are engaged to write reviews of scientific works for the daily press, than 

 the fact of one of those critics, who undertook to censure our former vo- 

 lume, being totally unacquainted with the difference between analogy and 

 aMnily! To him, it seems, they are only synonymous with "resem- 

 blances," and such " resemblances," forsooth, are to be ridiculed ! 



