320 Dana on the relations of Death to Life in Nature. 



Thus the carnivorous tribes were necessary to make the sys- 

 tem of life perfect. 



One word respecting the necessity of a check on the excessive 

 multiplication of individuals. Nature, as just now observed, is 

 a system of constantly varying conditions — of changing seasons, 

 winds, clouds : of inconstancy, under law, in all forces and cir- 

 cumstances. At the same time, the growth of a species requires 

 the nicest adjustment of special conditions in each case. On this 

 account the reproductive powers in species is in many cases ex- 

 cessively large, so that the various accidents to which the eggs 

 or young would be exposed, might not cause their extermina- 

 tion. This provision opened the way for occasional excessive 

 multiplication, and required a check from carnivorous races. 



6. Finally, could death be prevented in a system of living 

 beings in nature without constant miracle ? How should the 

 earth be managed to secure it against death ? It would be ne- 

 cessary to still the waves, for they are throwing animals and 

 plants on the coast to die ; to still the winds, for they are ever 

 destroying in some parts of their course ; to still even the streams 

 and rains. With winds and waves, not only helpless animals 

 and plants, but men's houses, ships, and boats, would now and 

 then be destroyed, in spite of prudent precaution and holy liv- 

 ing. But if we still the waves, the winds, and the streams, the 

 earth would rot in the stagnation, and here again is death ! 



We thus learn, that in life the fundamental idea of reproduc- 

 tion implies death ; the processes of life are the processes simul- 

 taneously of death ; the stability of the system of life requires 

 death ; the vegetable kingdom is made to feed animals, and tbe 

 animal kingdom, while containing plant-eaters, demands flesa- 

 eaters for its own balance, for the removal of the dead, and to 

 make out of dead flesh the proper food for plants, thus to pay its 

 debt to the vegetable kingdom. Hence death pervades the whole 

 system of life in its essence and physical laws; and it could not 

 be prevented in a world of active forces except by a constant 

 miracle ; and this would be an annihilation of nature, that is, o 

 a system of law. 



