520 THE PHILOSOPHY 



CHAPTER XXII. 



Of the ProgreJJlve Scale or Chain of Beings in the Univerfe. 



TO men of obfervation and refledion, it is apparent, that all 

 the beings on this earth, whether animals or vegetables, have 

 a mutual connedlion and a mutual dependence on each other. There 

 is a graduated fcale or chain of exiftence, not a link of which, how- 

 ever feemingly infignificant, could be broken without affedting the 

 whole. Superficial men, or, which is the fame thing, men who avoid 

 the trouble of ferious thinking, wonder at the defign of producing 

 certain infedts and reptiles. But they do not confider that the anni- 

 hilation of any one of thefe fpecies, though fome of them are incon- 

 venient, and even noxious to man, would make a blank in Nature, 

 and prove deftrudlive to other fpecies who feed upon them. Thefe, 

 in their turn, would be the caufe of deftroying other fpecies, and 

 the fyftem of devaftation would gradually proceed, till man himfelf 

 would be extirpated, and leave this earth deftiiute of all animation. 



In the chain of animals, man is unqueflionably the chief or capi- 

 tal link, and from him all the other links defcend by almoft imper- 

 ceptible gradations. As a highly rational animal, improved with 

 fcience and arts, he is, in fome meafure, related to beings of a fupe- 



rior 



