198 THE REIGN OF LAW. 



Origin of Species. So much the worse for his 

 theory, if this incompatibility be true. There is 

 indeed a difference, at least in words, between the 

 doctrine now asserted and the doctrine which Mr 

 Darwin denies. What he denies as a purpose in 

 nature is beauty " in the eyes of Man." But this 

 evades the real point at issue. The relation in 

 which natural beauty stands to Man's appreciation 

 of it, is quite a separate question. It is certain 

 enough that the gift of ornament in natural things 

 has not been lavished, as it is lavished, for the mere 

 admiration of Mankind. Ornament was as uni- 

 versal — applied upon a scale at once as grand and 

 as minute as now — during the long ages before 

 Man was born. Some of the most beautiful forms 

 in Nature are the shells of the marine Mollusca, 

 and many of them are the richest, too, in surface 

 ornament. But, prodigal of beauty as the Ocean 

 now is in the creatures which it holds, its wealth was 

 even greater and more abounding in times when 

 there was no man to gather them. The shells and 

 corals of the old Silurian Sea were as elaborate 

 and as richly carved as those which we now ad- 

 mire : and the noble Ammonites of the Second- 



