54 FIRST FORMS OF VEGETATION. 
and polished skulls and bones of hares and sheep 
which had furnished a meal to the fox or the eagle, 
or on droppings of game and cattle which browse 
upon the higher hills. This is the only vegetable 
we find to be contemporary with or posterior to 
the creation of animals, with the exception of 
minute microscopic entophytes which grow within 
the bodies of men and the lower animals, There 
was an obvious necessity for the universal pre- 
cedence of plants in creation, for the hard in- 
organic elements of the rocks had first to be con- 
verted by the vital energies of plants into organic 
substances, before animals could be sustained. It 
is true that the first created plant and the first 
created animal derived their origin alike from the 
inorganic soil, and were endowed alike with the 
power of converting heterogeneous matter into their 
own proper substance. But here the resemblance 
between them began and ended. The plant still 
possesses its original power of deriving its nourish- 
ment from the soil, while the animal has no such 
power, and is dependent for its support upon 
matter previously organized to a certain degree by 
the plant. Thus it is the peculiar function of the 
plant to effect that important change by which in- 
organic matter is converted into living substance ; 
it is in the organs of the plant that matter be- 
comes vital. This is by far the most wonderful 
